Why to Continue
by Doppler Effect
Summary: Ed pays a price for his brother's body and soul: starting a new life in the wizarding world of a different dimension. While being more than a little irritated at irrational people, Ed decides to help the Order, while giving the excuse of 'no memory'.
1. Hanging From Roof Tops is a Fun Sport

a/n: Basically, this is a HP/FMA crossover. This is a manga/brotherhood based Fullmetal Alchemist, by the way. And this takes place during HP5. Have to kick some Ministry butt, you know.

I don't own either series. Or at least, I don't think I do. But if I did it makes sense that I would remember that I do, so I don't think I do. Whatever. I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter.

* * *

The Truth deposited Ed on something hard. The white bastard hadn't let him sacrifice his alchemy, but had congratulated him on theoretically beating the Truth. Ed would almost go as far as to say that the Truth had acted like they were old friends playing chess and Ed had forgotten to say 'check', therefore not being allowed to count his win.

So instead, the Truth had retaken his arm for Al's soul, and transferred him to another dimension for Al's body. The Truth said that normally the dimension-changing would be a bit overboard, but since Ed would probably find a way back-to which Ed agreed-it actually did pay the correct price. So the price for Al's body wound up being only the _time_ Ed spent away.

Although none of that meant he had any idea where the hell he was.

Ed glanced around, and immediately felt his stomach drop. True, he was fine with heights.

Just not several thousand feet off the ground.

He glanced around, searching for the easiest way off the roof he was sitting on, and edged closer to a corner. He grabbed the part where the two corners met, and slid himself into the gap, bracing himself with both feet. Ed glanced down again and sighed as he realized that there was no real way down.

Well, when in doubt, there's always alchemy-

He barely got the thought out before something flew over his head. His grip slipped, and he fell between the corners. Whatever had shot by had flown past in front, diving toward him in a diagonal slant. Ed outstretched both arms, and one of them grabbed a window sill. Through sheer luck, it was his automail arm; if it had been the other one, it would've been yanked out of its socket.

His left arm whipped up to assist his right, and both legs found perches below him. Ed turned his head, searching for whatever had disturbed his earlier position.

A woman was sitting in front of him on a broom stick.

He almost let go again, before he heard the Truth sigh. Ed looked around wildly, searching for the white being…that apparently wasn't there.

"It seems I forgot something about dimensional travel. It's been a while. It's something I have to give you if I choose this punishment," the Truth said. The question barely floated through Ed's mind before the Truth answered it.

"Knowledge."

Like the first time, things poured into Ed's head. This time, instead of alchemy, it was about the world he was in. Some magic crap…creatures not called chimeras…Ministry…and still more came.

He regained his normal vision in what may have only been seconds later, since the woman was still in the exact same position. He glanced at her, and something told him her name was Professor McGonagall. The same thing told him he was dangling from a building called Hogwarts. Hogwarts? Who came up with a name like that? Name a school after a pig and expect people to come to it? Nice.

He was probably supposed to say something to the professor, wasn't he? "Um…how do I get down?"

"Get down? How did you get up here in the first place?" McGonagall asked incredulously.

"No idea. Can I get down?" Ed asked again, glancing down from his precarious position. The professor nodded and pulled out a stick-wand, whatever-and said something in what was probably a random language-Latin. He felt himself being lowered, and though it was probably supposed to be gentle, he found it disgruntling to not be in control.

A minute or so later and he felt his feet touch the ground. The professor had followed him down, and landed as he sagged against a wall.

"What were you doing up there?" McGonagall asked immediately.

Three answers flickered through his mind immediately. 1: Trying not to get myself killed. 2: Hold on, busy readjusting my atoms after coming in from another dimension. Once all my brain particles are here, I'll fully answer that question. The third one seemed like the best response. "I…don't know," Ed said, putting on a confused expression.

"You do not know how you got here?" Professor McGonagall asked, bordering between confused and worried. "Then what's the last thing you remember?"

"I…I don't remember anything," Ed said, looking away. Anyone who knew him well enough knew he was lying from either a) seeing him act before and do a pretty damn good job or b) catching the evil glint in his eyes he got when he conned someone.

"Do you remember your name, by any chance?" McGonagall looked like she believed his story. After all, spells _did_ sometimes backfire with odd results.

"…" No way in hell was he going by some name someone randomly made up for him. But saying that would be saying he did actually remember. "No."

Professor McGonagall smiled gently. "That's alright. You'll remember. Madame Pomfrey can probably give you something that will let you remember, or you'll just regain your memories on your own. Come. Let's speak to Headmaster Dumbledore."

Ed nodded, and followed her as they walked into the school. After a few minutes, Ed realized that if he didn't know _who _he was, why would he know _where_ he was? "Where am I?"

"You're at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," she said promptly, and hesitated before turning down a hallway. "Headmaster Dumbledore will probably want Professor Snape with us." She told him to wait at the top of some stairs while she descended. A few minutes later, and she came back with a man who was introduced to him as Professor Snape, which Ed already knew.

They walked down a few more hallways before arriving at the feet of a very large stone griffin. Professor McGonagall said something very strange, and the griffin moved aside. The two professors and the alchemist walked up a circular staircase, and came into a room. Someone was sitting behind a desk in there: Professor Dumbledore. He looked up in slight surprise, gaze coming to rest on Ed.

"Do we have a new student?" he asked, leaning forward and resting his clasped hands on his desk.

"I do not know," Professor McGonagall responded. "I found him trying to climb down from our roof, and flew up on my broom to assist. He doesn't know who he is."

Headmaster Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "He doesn't?"

"Not a thing."

Dumbledore nodded. "Has he seen Madame Pomfrey yet?"

"No. I was planning on taking him there next," Professor McGonagall said. Dumbledore nodded, and waved all three down the stairs. He followed, and they walked to where Ed assumed the infirmary or whatever they called it was. Ed was still stuck on the whole 'Hogwarts' thing.

During the last few seconds in the walk to the medical ward, Dumbledore strode ahead. He called for Madame Pomfrey, who appeared from a door almost immediately. Dumbledore quickly explained, and Ed was subtly nudged forward by one of the two professors behind him.

Madame Pomfrey frowned slightly and nodded. "I'll get him something. If he still doesn't remember, he's either been cursed or he lost his memory from something traumatic, and it would either be best if he either didn't remember or remembered on his own." She walked to a small cabinet and pulled out a jar. She measured out an amount, and administered it to Ed.

He hoped there wouldn't be any odd side effects since he hadn't really lost his memory.

Luckily for him, nothing happened.

"Do you remember anything?" Madame Pomfrey pressed.

He shook his head. "No. Not a thing." Maybe he could slip in his name here… "Ed," he said suddenly, making the four adults look at him. "Yeah, Ed sounds about right."

"Your name?" Dumbledore confirmed, and Ed nodded. "Is that all?" Ed gave another nod. He was really itching to say something, but he was playing the part of a lost boy with no memory. Oh well. The time for snide remarks would come later. "It's a start," Dumbledore continued. "Hm…where shall we put you? Would you like to become a student here?"

Hell no. "I…get the feeling I don't get along well with other kids…" Ed said. Well, he didn't. But it was mostly the adults he couldn't stand. He'd really like to flash his military pocket watch at them. Except it wouldn't mean squat here.

Dumbledore nodded. "That's alright. Do you know how old you are?"

It would probably be a bit of a stretch. "No."

"I can probably tell," Madame Pomfrey said. She turned to Ed, and told him to open his mouth. After a few seconds, she said he was roughly fifteen or sixteen.

"All right. Do you know any magic?" Dumbledore asked.

Knowing that he could catch up quickly, Ed nodded.

"Do you have a wand?"

Er…big no. If he had been carrying a wand around in Amestris, they would've stuck him in a psychiatric ward. Hell, he was surprised they hadn't done that anyway. He probably would've driven the people who were taking care of the crazies crazy, though. Ed shook his head.

"We can get you one. Ministry law requires, however, that all minors go to school." Ed felt a tick mark on his head at a word that in any way implied 'small', but held it in. "School starts in a month and a half, so we'll see if we can teach you in a different way then being in a class full of students. We have a spare room."

Ed nodded. "I think I can deal with that." Bottling up attitude was not something Ed excelled in. He was more used to just punching people in the face.

Dumbledore nodded. "The new Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher will be a Ministry official, so she might be able to help you figure out where your family is. We'll have to contact them as soon as possible. Hopefully they will send out a notice about your absence."

Ed felt like ice was dripping on his insides at the word 'family' and 'absence'. His only family was probably Al, since Hohenheim's Stone wouldn't survive much longer after being divided and fighting the Father. And the only other people he could count as his family were either mourning his death from their view, or preparing to run him over with something like a tank when he got back. They would have no idea where he was. Why would they?

So, yeah, his 'family' would need to be alerted if only so they would either stop digging his grave, or gearing up their tanks, or fists, or whatever else they planned to run him over/hit him with.

Since Ed didn't respond, there were a few moments of awkward silence before Snape led him to a spare room, and Dumbledore and McGonagall went to the Headmaster's office to talk.

"I believe there are books you can borrow in the trunk there," Snape said, gesturing to a trunk at the foot of the bed. Ed figured the books would be helpful, since while the Truth had provided him with the names of important people he'd need to know, which he probably could have figured out by himself, the Truth was lacking in the information about the actual _usage_ of magic. "And clothes should be in there." He motioned to a wardrobe opposite the bed and trunk. "Good day." Snape turned and walked briskly from the room.

Ed had a feeling he would hate it there until the moment he left. Especially when he saw what was in the wardrobe. Robes? Really? What was this, the medieval ages?

* * *

Dumbledore and McGonagall talked quietly in the former's office.

"I do not know if he actually remembers or not. Names are sometimes the first thing that people with memory loss remember." McGonagall said.

"I agree with you. But I believe he is not cursed, but perhaps traumatized. There is great knowledge side by side and hand in hand with the weight of the world, a look I have seen only on few and rare occasions of some of the fiercest and strongest wizards," Dumbledore said. "I never thought I would see that look on a child of his age."

"From what I have heard of Umb-_Professor_ Umbridge, we may need to find an excuse to be shielding him from the other students," McGonagall said the name of the Ministry official and her soon-to-be title with great disdain.

"Yes, yes we will," Dumbledore agreed. "But hopefully he will either remember, or his family will make an absence notice about him before then."

McGonagall nodded. "Shall we treat him like the other students? Or instead like an adult?"

Dumbledore paused. "It may be best to give him advice. I believe he is currently bottling his personality in exchange for learning about his surroundings at the moment, but once he settles in, he may figure out things on his own. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if he does before Harry and his friends. Yes, I think he can handle things in the position of an acting-adult. Which he appears to be very good at. He's not all that frightened about his memory loss."

McGonagall nodded. "When should we tell him?"

"When he starts showing his true personality," Dumbledore said, "which I suspect should be any time now."

* * *

Ed snored. By his head were two stacks of books, one finished and the other nearly done. So far, he'd read through up to the fifth year. He'd almost killed the nearby wall and stormed through it until he was given an answer about transfigurations, but had (somehow) managed to not take out his anger on the wall. Instead, he'd taken out his displeasure on the book by throwing the book across the room. After finishing all the other books in the first year, he'd reluctantly retrieved and finished it before moving on to the next year.

A small tug on his arm didn't in the slightest wake him. A slightly harder tug had the same effect. There was a small sigh, and then a snap. The finished books by Ed's head rose a few inches before dropping loudly back down on the table. He jerked up, looking around in surprise. His eyes settled on the house elf standing beside him.

"Huh…?" He said drowsily to no one in particular.

"Dobby has brought your lunch, sir," the house elf said.

Ed looked confused for a few seconds, before realizing that Dobby was actually speaking in third person. "Oh…thanks," he said, and nodded in appreciation at Dobby.

"You're welcome, sir."

"You don't need to call me that," Ed said, sighing. He'd really had enough of people calling him 'sir' all the time. It had taken him weeks of complaining about it for Lieutenants Ross and Brosch to get them to stop. He didn't want to have to do that _again_.

"Sir is most kind," Dobby said, completely ignoring what Ed had just said.

Ed sighed again. "Please just call me Ed."

The house elf didn't verbally respond, but instead nodded. A few minutes later of debating what Ed's real name was (Ed vs. sir), and the house elf Dobby left him to study his endless supply of useless crappy books, that had so far contradicted themselves two hundred and twenty-four times, borderlining damn near impressive.

A few hours later, with a finished lunch tray beside him, and he set aside his last book. With a groan, he rubbed his head and noticed with vague amusement that he hadn't bookmarked a single page. Normally, his books had tons of small slips of paper sticking out of them. That said something about how stupid kids were these days to be failing after reading books that easy. Or maybe it just said something about how the term 'child prodigy' was an understatement in Ed's case. Either way, who cared?

Someone knocked on the door. Ed made an acknowledgement, and the door opened. Dumbledore smiled at him, and nodded at the pile of books. "Did you finish all of them already?"

"Yeah. They weren't exactly all that hard," Ed said. He glanced up at the other person. "What is it?"

"As you may have figured, when school starts, tensions between one of our students, Harry Potter, and this Ministry official, Professor Dolores Umbridge, will be strained. Professor Umbridge will be trying to get Harry expelled from the school and unseat me from my position as Headmaster. The Ministry is feeling very threatened with whispers of Lord Voldemort being back. I will say that Harry says this is true, and I believe him. You can make your own decision. Because of this, we also have tensions between students about who's right and who's wrong," Dumbledore explained.

"So…?" Ed said, unsure what Dumbledore was asking, or what he wanted to achieve.

"Professor McGonagall and I thought it best if you knew ahead of time," Dumbledore said. "So you weren't launched into the middle of things without knowing."

Okay… "Er, thanks?" Once again, what were people _thinking_? Some poor kid's born, and what is the first thing his parents think? 'Oh, let's name the kid Voldemort! Which isn't a real name, and will probably turn him into some psychopath murderer.' "Who's the Ministry siding with?"

"The Ministry? They're not siding with Voldemort or Harry. They think Voldemort is still dead."

"So they…never mind. Some people are just born stupid, and there's nothing you can about it," Ed sighed. "Look, it's going to be boring just sitting around all day. If you want, I can pass the tests mentioned in there. If I can piss someone off who deserves it, I'd be a lot happier. I'll help you and the Order of the Phoenix."

Dumbledore nodded. "You figured it out that fast?"

Ed shrugged. "I'm good at figuring stuff like that out. If there's a conspiracy theory, I know about it. If there's a secret organization helping a kid fight some lunatic, I know about it. If some dead guy's now a zombie, I know about it." Or the Truth happened to provide those two little details.

"Thank you for your assistance, Ed," Dumbledore said. He smiled again, and then walked from the room.

* * *

a/n: The whole thing with not saying 'check' in chess was something that happened to me. I'd only played once or twice, and I ended up playing with someone at a camp I went to. I think he said he was one of his school's competitors, and he might have just been ticked that I beat him on accident by killing his king with a pawn, so I'm not sure if that's correct.

And yes, I do know 'Voldemort' isn't his real name. I just wanted to poke some fun at it.

I had a bunch of period/quote issues that I cleared up, and I'm also going back through all my writings and editing everything again. I should be typing, but this is something that's commonly known as 'PROCRASTINATION'.


	2. When Pissing off the Ministry

a/n: This is an inserted chapter to help things make more sense. So I hope I make this compatible with the chapters around it.

By the way, I'm not sure if floo power works in Hogwarts or not, but if it doesn't…well…then when I say that think instead that they used Fawkes.

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. Because I'm not Hiromu Arakawa or J. K. Rowlings. So take that.

* * *

Dumbledore knocked on Ed's door. Ed looked up, and let him enter. Dumbledore nodded to Ed and closed the door. "Ed, the Ministry would like to speak with you."

"Oh fun," Ed said. "Now?"

"Yes. When someone loses their memory, they're normally sent to a hospital to try and regain their memory," Dumbledore said. "They're debating on whether or not to send you to school or to the hospital."

Ed sighed. He bookmarked the book he was reading, and pushed it aside. He stood, and walked out, past Dumbledore. "Great. More acting," he muttered to himself. Dumbledore didn't acknowledge the oddness of the statement.

Dumbledore led them to his office, and handed Ed some ash. He told him what to say, and Ed sighed. He stepped into the fireplace, and threw the ash down. "Ministry of Magic."

Seconds later, he was standing in the Ministry. Glancing around, he stepped out of it. Dumbledore walked out behind him. He motioned him down one of the hallways. "This way."

The two made their way down the long and wide hall, until they turned down a corner. After a few more turns, and a random elevator ride, they made it to their destination. Dumbledore pushed the door open.

A chair was sitting in the center of rows of elevated platforms. Ed guessed there was about fifty people there, sitting in benches. He somehow managed to not glare back at the ones who glanced down at him. He reminded himself he was playing the part of a lost kid with no memory who had no idea of his past. Well, acting came naturally to him after all this time.

The people waited for him to take the seat before they began. He stood in front of the chair and waited two minutes before someone, who was apparently the Minister of Magic, cleared his throat to start.

"Let us begin. Are you ready?" Cornelius Fudge called down to a red head on the first row, who gave a 'yes'. "We are deciding whether or not to send you to the Spell Damage ward of St. Mungo's Hospital, or to send you to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," the Minister said to Ed. "This will be a brief meeting, but one that still needs to be dealt with. We have never had a child get caught in the cross fire and end up in this situation."

Ed refrained from leaping up to where the Minister was sitting and smashing his head into a wall. While it might be fun, it wouldn't get them anywhere.

"Because we need someone to fill the position of Dolores Jane Umbridge, Undersecretary to the Minster, who is preparing to become the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, we have Lucius Malfoy here as a consultant," Fudge motioned to the person sitting beside him, "since he has a child in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and is the most able to fill her position at the moment.

"Now. Do you have any memory?"

"My name's Ed. That's it." He was finding keeping a quiet demeanor hard.

"Anything other than that?"

"No."

"And you have no memory of what brought you to that state?"

Ed's eyes mockingly widened. "I _don't_? Wow, I never knew that."

A tick appeared on Fudge's head. "A simple yes or no will suffice."

"Too bad," Ed said immediately. Several people in the benches were shifting uncomfortably. "No I don't remember anything. What else do you want to ask that has an obvious answer?"

"Please refrain from side comments." Ed rolled his eyes at Fudge. "Do you have any wish to go to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?"

"Sure. More stuff to read there then in the hospital."

"What?"

"More books there than the hospital. Want me to repeat that again, or spell it out for you?"

"No. How are you dealing with your memory loss on your own?"

"I don't think about it."

The people on the benches exchanged whispers.

"You don't think about your condition?"

"No. What's to think about? It'll either come back or it won't. I'm not handicapped or anything."

Fudge frowned. A woman by him spoke him up. "You don't worry about your memory loss?"

"No."

"Do you want it to come back?"

"I might not like what I find. In some cases, it's better not knowing."

More murmurs.

Fudge's frown deepened. He glanced around the wizards in the benches. "Does anyone have any questions for him?"

Malfoy raised his hand, and Fudge nodded at him. "The most likely thing that would have happened to him would have been a misfired curse. Would it be wise to put him in a school with other kids? In case his spells tend to be…inaccurate."

Ed felt a tick mark. Yes, he obviously fired a spell that was pointed at himself and happened to screw it up. Duh.

Another woman raised her hand as Fudge nodded at Malfoy in agreement. Ed was pretty sure Fudge was just trying to piss him off. Fudge nodded at the woman. "If so, then wouldn't it be best to send him to school to allow him to learn how to use spells properly?"

"Excuse me," Dumbledore said. "But there is something you are missing. Ed _was_ injured when we found him. Those injuries would have been impossible to have been inflicted by a misfired and misused spell that was his."

A flash of irritation flew across the faces of Fudge and Malfoy, probably because their points had just evaporated. Ed noted, though, that the Truth had mended his clothes when he had come through, and no one knew he had been injured. Although the Truth hadn't exactly given him a bath, so maybe Dumbledore had just assumed he had been injured and hadn't told anyone. Which was true. He'd healed perfectly fine on his own.

Whispering began, clearly deciding what was going to be done. After a while, Ed glaring at everyone the whole time, someone finally said, "Those in favor of sending him to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

Almost everyone raised their hands.

"And those in favor of sending him to St. Mungo's." Just about no one raised their hands.

Ed left, barely hearing them say some more formalities. He was never one for them, anyway. It wasn't like he was going to waste his time for someone to tell him something he already knew.

* * *

a/n: Sorry this chapter was so short! This was made after I already did a lot, and I stuck it in to make sure it actually made sense.


	3. Lights, Camera, Act

a/n: This is another inserted chapter. So here we go, and I hope this matches with everything else. This chapter is because I didn't put Ed's mental state right, in the way I was showing. So this is really what he was leaning more toward in his mind, even though he put on a different front.

I have to say, I really don't like this chapter, because it puts a serious note in things. Hell, if you don't want to read something serious, go ahead and skip this chapter. I don't really care. I mean, seriously when the _author_ is saying she doesn't like this chapter? The only funny part of this was the last break before the a/n at the bottom. Anyway. If you do read this, know that this isn't like the rest of the chapters. The rest are more Ed pwning Umbridge and Malfoy, and are a lot funnier than this one. Well, except for when the Amestrians reunite...

I mention professors only vaguely mentioned, so I'm putting a list of the lesser known ones up here so you know who I'm talking about.

Irma Pince: librarian

Septima Vector: Arithmacy (I had to make up her personality. No clue if I got it right. Hehe, whoops about the first time I posted this. I kind of thought Vector was a guy, but apparently Vector's a female. Whoops…)

Aurora Sinistra: Astronomy (Another one where I had no idea if or when they mentioned her personality, so another made up one)

Charity Burbage: Muggle Studies (again, made up personality)

Bathsheba Babbling: Ancient Runes (guess what? made up personality)

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist and Harry Potter.

* * *

Dobby left for the second time that day to take Ed's tray away, since he didn't go down to eat with the teachers. Ed waited a minute before he pushed aside the stack of books in front of him and bolted out the door. Running down the hallway, his mind went from efficiently calculating the mistakes he'd found in the Arithmacy to book, to frantically trying to figure out what he could do.

What he could do to get home.

Knowing the librarian was with everyone else in the Great Hall, eating, he all but flew into the library and started his search. The magic books weren't really much help, but it was better than nothing. He couldn't sit still, knowing he might have a chance to get home. He flipped through several books, tossed them into an ever-growing pile, and moved on, looking, searching.

None of the teachers knew about this. He kept a calm mask on, carefully moving them to his will. Trying to figure out if they could help him. If they knew he was in this state, they'd want to know why. Dumbledore had offered to do Legilimency, but Ed had again used the excuse he didn't want to know his past. Occasionally, a teacher would invite him to eat with the others, but he found some sort of way out of it. Although he was pretty sure he was going to slip up soon.

* * *

Weeks passed in this manner. Frantic searching gained his time, and days slipped by spent in the library. People who knew him would say this wasn't out of the ordinary, except in the desperate manner he attended to it. The mask he threw up in a half-hearted attempt to fool the professors began to fail as he cared less and less about it. The brief shock of what had happened had long past, and his mind no longer sheltered him from what was really happening. Reality settled in.

* * *

"What did you just say you were going to try to do?" Snape asked McGonagall, incredulous. He barely managed to keep his true emotions out of his face and voice.

"I'm going to talk to him. Something's not right with him, and it's not just lost memory," McGonagall said briskly.

Pomphrey sighed. "Minerva, he probably just needs other children to talk to and associate with. He hasn't seen anyone his age since he lost his memory, and he probably feels very lonesome. Once the other kids arrive, he'll perk up."

"What child spends all their time in a library?" Pince said. "True, I'm not all that inviting, and even the book-lovers don't spend as much time in my library as he does! Filch has reported seeing him in there several times, enough for him to be in there 24/7. I catch some glimpses of him, but he never responds when I ask if it's him there. And sometimes, when I'm going back into the library in the morning, there are already stacks of books from where he's been reading. I don't think I've ever said this about a child who loves books that much, but something about that is messing with his head."

"Oh, Irma, Minerva, you're probably both overreacting," Grubbly-Plank said nervously.

They both looked doubtful.

"I've got a better question to be asking," Flitwick said, catching the attention of the others. "Has anyone actually _seen_ him in the past week? Other than seeing just a figure moving around a corner or something."

The professors looked in between each other, seeing if anyone had. But there were only shaking heads.

"Well, then I must side with Minerva and Irma," Flitwick said. "First child ever to be able to sneak around Hogwarts that well. Even Peeves is complaining about not being able to prank him. He finds it quite annoying."

"Of course he does," Vector said irritably.

"Well, should we all go talk to the boy?" Sinistra asked. "If we all put forth an effort..."

"He may just ignore us," Snape said, poking his food. "And you still have to find him."

"We could ambush him in his room," Babbling said, almost hopefully.

"I think that would freak him out," Flitwick said, smiling. "Although it might work as a last resort."

"We are the worst welcoming party," Sprout noted. "We're planning to hunt down and ambush a shy boy who hasn't done anything wrong."

"If we can't pull him out of his state, the other students may not even know he exists," Burbage put forth. "It is probably just a mixture of things. Memory loss, no one to talk to, and confusion. Give him time."

"All about time, isn't it?" Binns said suddenly. "There was a point in Hogwart's history, when the wizard Jotora Kly* relied entirely on time to..." The rest of the professors quietly began to evacuate the room, leaving finished or unfinished meals behind.

* * *

McGonagall knocked softly on Ed's door. Despite what had been said, Sinistra, Pince, Grubbly-Plank, Hooch, Flitwick, Trelawney, Babbling, Burbage, Vector, Snape, and Sprout were all standing in the hallway behind her. Although Sprout and Flitwick had said they were only there to push the other teachers out of the room when it came time for them to leave.

McGonagall guessed they were really just as curious as the rest of them were.

After a few more pauses and knocks, Snape said, "Don't tell me we came all that way, and he's not here."

"Oh, Severus, it wasn't that far. And besides, we know where he went," Sinistra calmly said. "Library!" She turned on her heel, and walked quickly to the room mentioned.

"How do we know we'll find him? I've already said I've tried to find him in there," Pince said.

"Yes, but there's all of us, and not just one of you," Sprout said cheerfully. "We'll find him."

* * *

"...Okay, how the hell does this kid know the school better than we do?" Vector finally broke the silence, scowling. "This is just ridiculous!"

"No kidding," Flitwick murmured. "Ed...? Are you in here?"

Ed, who was crouching unnoticed on top of a book shelf right above Flitwick, didn't respond. He just continued reading, and waited for the teachers to disperse. Although he was really starting to like several of their attitudes toward this. It was kind of funny. Even Snape was starting to get irritated.

"You know, I can probably create a potion that'll smoke him out," Snape said, glancing behind another shelf of books.

"Or I can release a plant," Sprout, who had apparently forgotten what she'd said earlier, agreed. "Can it really be this hard to find one student? True, we don't have all the other students looking for him..."

"Are we sure he's even in the building?" Babbling asked.

"Dobby the house elf said he saw Ed an hour ago, when he took his lunch tray," Burbage responded on the opposite end of the library. "Should we ask the house elves to help, or try to find them ourselves? Has anyone even contacted Dumbledore yet?"

"Do we really want him to know we're trying to figure out if we lost a kid in our own school or not?" Pince replied.

"We should probably try to find him first. We've only searched two rooms," Flitwick said. "He might not even know we're looking for him."

"If he's not here, where do we go-hey!" Vector shouted, angrily brushing aside a book that had fallen on her head.

"Septima? Are you alright?" McGonagall called.

"Yeah..." Vector scowled, and looked up. She barely glanced a knee moving out of sight. "...I think I found him. Hey!" She called out, grabbing a balled up paper that had been thrown on the floor, and threw it at where she'd seen the knee disappear. "New kid!"

"His name's Ed," Sprout said, turning into Vector's lane of the library.

"Whatever." Vector scowled at the knee. "You there?"

Flitwick, on the other side, was levitating himself up on a desk. He came even with the top of the shelf, and saw the blond alchemist crouched on the shelf, intently reading. He didn't seem to be noticing his surroundings. Flitwick hesitantly said, "Ed...?" He waved a hand in between Ed's eyesight rang and the book. "Hey, are you listening?"

Ed jerked backward, looking around. "Huh?"

Flitwick sighed. "Have you been up here this whole time?" Ed nodded.

"Oh give me a break," Vector muttered below them. Sprout shot her a look.

"Yeah, I've been up here. Why?" Ed said, not particularly caring.

"Well, er, were you listening?"

"No, not really." He glanced down at his book again, wondering if they'd let him read, or if there was even a reason to this.

"Ed? Could you...come down here?" McGonagall asked. "And once again, how did you get up there?"

"I climbed," Ed said simply, easily slipping down the side of the book case. The gathering professors looked at him in surprise. He returned their gazes, and said, "What? Something wrong?"

"We were...concerned." Sinistra said.

Ed glanced blankly at her. "Why?"

The professors had obviously not thought this far ahead. They exchanged looks, trying to get the others to say something to the increasing awkward silence.

"We were talking," McGonagall explained, "and some things were pointed out. None of us have seen you in the past week, or mostly before that. Even Peeves hasn't been able to pull pranks on you. You haven't really spoken to anyone. Should I continue?"

Ed's uncomprehending gaze came to rest on her. "Um...no?"

McGonagall sighed. He didn't get it. "Are you okay, Ed?"

"...No. Why wouldn't I be okay?" His voice was absent of emotion, which made the oddness of the two sentences combined even stranger.

There was a pause in the conversation, before Pince asked what had been bothering her. "What are you looking for? You've gone through the whole library. Several times."

"A way back," Ed said. He glanced back up where he'd left the book.

Several of the professors were frowning by that point. "Where?" Babbling hesitantly asked. Ed glanced at her, but didn't respond. He continued watching the professors with an unfocused gaze.

"A way back where?" McGonagall asked. "Why do you need to go back?"

"...Amestris..." Ed whispered. Even the closest professor strained to hear what he said, and still couldn't tell. Ed shook his head. "I-I don't know. I just...need to go back somewhere." He turned away from them, and started to walk out to the doors of the library.

McGonagall caught his arm, and tugged him lightly around to face her. "Where do you need to go?" She said firmly, staring him in the eyes. As she examined his, she noticed that the boy she'd found on the roof was hiding. Hiding from the professors around her until it was safe to reemerge.

Ed stared blankly at her for a few seconds. Then his face filled with emotion. "...Home," he whispered. He turned away from McGonagall, who looked surprised.

"Where is-" She began.

"No..." Ed said. "No. I can't go home. I need to go...back."

"Ed?" Sprout asked nervously. "W-What are you talking about?"

Pomphrey pulled McGonagall away from Ed. "I don't think he's handling this too well. Just...back off a bit, alright? He's not holding together."

McGonagall nodded, and turned back to Ed. She calmly looked at him, and said, "Okay, Ed. Listen to me. _Drop this_. Forget about getting back. Without your memory, you can't do anything. We'll figure it out, but right now, you're not helping yourself, or anyone else. I've seen thousands of kids pass through these walls, and I know when they take a turn for the worst."

Ed blinked, looking at her. Slowly, he nodded. "Fine," he said, glancing back up at the shelf.

"Are you listening to me?" McGonagall said, irritation edging her voice.

"Yeah," Ed said, walking back toward the shelf. "It's just going to be hard for you to get this down again without dropping it." Ed climbed back up the shelf, and stopped when his head was poking over the top. He reached up, and one by one, dropped the books into a neat stack on the floor. After the last one, he landed beside them. He glanced at their shocked expressions. "What?" he said irritably.

"Um..." Sinistra said. "Okay then."

The minute the last professor departed from him to go to their room, Ed smirked. He hadn't had to act that well in _years. _He'd had to pull off some acting stunts to stay in the military, when some superior officers 'didn't want a child in the military with the ability to order people below him'. Ed had punched the first person who said that, and had managed to weasel himself out of getting disharged by acting. **

Although he had to admit, the professors were kind of dense. He'd been acting ever since he'd gotten there, and _no one_ had noticed? It was almost impressive.

...But it'd been too easy. Before, he'd either pretended to be self-centered, innocent, or greedy. This time...it'd been too easy. Too easy to act.

Ed scowled, and shrugged it off. The hell with it. Now all he had to pretend to be was someone with no memory. Which wouldn't be too hard. No one would be asking him questions after the event in the library, which had been the whole reason for the act.

He had learned one thing, though. He couldn't get back home from what he had here. The alchemy was too screwed up. He couldn't use it as a research basis. Maybe if he tried to combine his alchemy and magic...

He'd figure something out.

He always did.

* * *

"Do you think it worked? What we did yesterday?" Babbling asked McGonagall as she met her in the Great Hall for breakfast.

"I don't know. He seemed to be perking up when we were all walking back to our rooms," McGonagall responded. "Irma said she invited Ed again to join us for breakfast."

Babbling gave her a horrified look. "No. Oh no she didn't. _Please_ tell me she didn't."

McGonagall frowned. "She did. Why? Is something wrong with that? We've asked him before."

Babbling looked around, and not seeing whoever she was looking for, she whispered. "Guess who's coming today?"

McGonagall barely supressed a groan. "Umbridge is coming _now_?"

"Too late to do anything about it," Vector said, scowling, as she walked in. "She's already here. She hasn't met Ed yet, but she's going to. I've already spread the word that if anyone sees Ed, to tell him not to come if he doesn't want to meet her."

Sprout, who was already seated at the table, groaned and put her head in her hands. "And we just got through to him. I hope he's a fast recoverer. A _really_ fast recoverer."

"Who's a fast recoverer?" a voice suddenly said, trying something at sweetness and failing.

The professors turned to see who had come in. It was Umbridge. She had just entered, and had not been able to hear other than a few words that had been said.

"Poppy was just talking about a fast recovering patient she had," McGonagall said smoothly. She glanced at Pomphrey, who nodded. "Did you just come in this morning?" She asked, pushing the conversation away from Ed.

"Yes..." Umbridge said, and walked past McGonagall to the table. "So tell me, how is Headmaster Dumbledore doing these days?"

_'Jumping straight for a kill, are you? This kill will be slipping away, however.'_ McGonagall thought, narrowing her eyes at Umbridge. "He's doing fine. How is the Minister doing with publicity? I hear-"

"The Minister is doing fine as well. Thank you for your concern," Umbridge interrupted.

One of the side doors into the Great Hall opened, allowing in a few more teachers. McGonagall felt her stomach drop as she saw Ed among them, curiously looking around the room. Ed's eyes fell to Umbridge, and distaste crossed his face. His gaze moved on, however, and he ignored the toad.

"A student is here early?" Umbridge asked McGonagall, who wished to be anywhere but in the Great Hall at that minute.

"Yes. Ed is the one who was sent to your Ministry to see if he would be going to the hospital or joining us in school this year," McGonagall said promptly. "As he has been allowed to stay here, Ed has stayed at the school until classes begin."

"Ah, yes," Umbridge said. She turned to Ed, and said like she was talking to a five year old, "Hello, I am Professor Umbridge. I will be your Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher this year, so I hope-"

Ed ignored her, and walked past the Ministry official to the table. Umbridge paused mid-sentence, now feeling stupid, and turned to face Ed's back. Ed exchanged a glance of 'Do we _really_ have to deal with her all year?' with McGonagall, and then walked on to the table. He snatched a roll from it, and walked on. Sarcastically, and without a hint of honesty, he said, "Good luck sticking around this year. The DADA teachers seem to be having trouble doing so. The curse, and all."

"There is no curse on the position, I assure you," Umbridge said, trying to reesatblish dominancy.

Ed glanced at her over his shoulder and smirked, opening the door he had walked to at the same time. "Really? Then that's one hell of a lot of coincidences."

Umbridge stared at him, gaping, as he walked out the door and slammed the door shut. Then she closed her mouth, and stormed out after Ed. After a few seconds, the professors exchanged glances.

"She's not going to find him, is she?" Flitwick asked no one in particular. The professors all shook their heads 'no' at the same time.

In the pause that followed, Trelawney announced something. "I like this kid! He's definitely going to make this year interesting!" The other professors stared at her, but found they agreed. With a smart-mouthed kid around like that, not to mention a Dark Lord planning to kill a lot of people and take over the world, the year was _definitely_ going to be interesting.

* * *

* He doesn't exist. Or her. I don't even know, and I _invented_ this person. I guess it depends on how you pronounce it.

** no idea if this is anywhere near true. But it sounds like something he'd do.

I don't think this matches with everything else, but whatever. It fills in some gaps I left open.


	4. Hitching a Train Ride

a/n: This is something I might want to mention. _{I'm the beta reader, Tsuki, hijacking the a/n. Just kidding... so far.} _I haven't read the Order of the Phoenix since fourth grade. Luckily, my sister owns all the Harry Potter books, so I just went into her room and stole it. She won't mind. Especially since she's my beta reader. (hi Tsuki!) _{This is Tsuki strangling Sekai. Don't mind me too much.} _I just skim through it as I get to the part I'm at. I hope I don't get anything wrong, and if I do, tell me!

I have up until ten chapters already written. I'm not posting them because I'll go on random breaks, and those are to fill it. I'll try and post every two to three days, though. This one I'm posting early, because, as some of you may know who live in North America, we're being hit by a big ice/snow storm, and the best of hit last night, and the ground here is covered in an inch or so of ice. I'm not sure how much longer the power lines will be up, so I'm posting this early in case the lines fall to tell you the break is not my fault, and I'll be continuing the story.

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. You know how I know that? Because a) I'm shit at drawing and b) I'm not one of the richest people to ever walk the face of the earth. So I can definitely say I don't own either series. _{But I do!} _(Sekai knocks out Tsuki with a random lead pipe.) (She's kidding. I hope...)

* * *

As the train took off from Hogwarts to pick up the kids, Ed hitched a ride. _Just like old times…_ Ed thought longingly. He slipped into the back, and sat in one of the booths. After an hour of sketching alchemy drawings on the misty window pane beside him, Ed gave up and went to sleep.

When he woke, the train was jerking to a halt. Realizing that there was no way to find Harry and his friends, he opened the window and climbed up the side until he was resting on the top of the train. Luckily, the side he was on wasn't the one people were standing on.

As the train began to pull away, he thought he saw a black dog wandering off the platform. Did someone lose their dog…no. That wasn't a dog. He'd read about people being able to change themselves into animals. The dog glanced up at the train, and stopped in surprise when it saw Ed. Ed put two and two together, and guessed the dog was probably Sirius. The only person who would need to be disguised, but also be at the station would be someone from the Order. And Sirius _was_ wanted.

Ed waved, and he got a sort of dog-grin as a response. The dog bobbed his head in greeting at Ed, and Ed smiled, before opening the window below him and clambering back inside. Minutes later, and Sirius's face appeared in Dumbledore's office, asking what the hell had happened to the rules of the train that went to Hogwarts that said kids were to stay _inside_ the bus when it was in motion.

Ed sighed, and started trying to find out where Harry and his friends were. If he was going to piss off an authority government-like-thing, which he seemed to be making a habit of lately, he'd want to know everything he could about it so he could push their buttons.

As it would turn out, appearing inconspicuous and also trying to find three particular people was a lot harder than it appeared. He even _ran into_ one of the people, who was apparently a prefect now and was patrolling the bus, and had her point him in the general direction he was supposed to go.

He _still_ got lost.

It was only when an obnoxious voice caught his attention that he finally figured out where they were. The obnoxious voice apparently belonged to an even more obnoxious blond. "You see, I, unlike you-"

"Are an annoying pain in the ass. So you, unlike me, need to get out of my, not yours, way, before, I, unlike you, slam your, not my, annoying head into a wall," Ed said, in full annoying mode. The blond kid whipped around to glare at him, along with two people behind him.

"Shut up! I'm a prefect! I can give you detention! What's your name? Who are you?" the kid shouted at him.

Now Ed recognized him. Some kid named Malfoy with a super-rich father that he sucked up to. "My name is Really Annoying, and as for who I am, I'm the opposite of your father's ass."

Malfoy's jaw practically hit the floor. The two behind him didn't look much better, and the ones in the train compartment were cracking up.

"Y-you l-little-" Malfoy stuttered out. Ed got a tick mark on his head, and Malfoy made the idiotic decision to try and punch Ed.

Ed snorted in amusement, and grabbed the fist. He flipped Malfoy over his shoulder, and he heard him hit the floor somewhere behind him. He raised an eyebrow at the other two. One lumbered toward him, and Ed knocked his kneecap out of position. The other got a face full of what the wall of the train looked like.

"Something the three of you should take into consideration next time: I've seen rocks that can fight better than you. And another thing: you _can't_ put me in detention, because I'm also a prefect. So deal with it. And hope there's a nurse on board." He shrugged, and walked into the compartment. He nudged one of their arms out of the way before he closed the door. At the stunned faces, he simply said, "They'll get over it." A groan from one of them punctuated the sentence. "Well, maybe," Ed added.

"That…was bloody amazing!" someone who he assumed was Ron from the red hair, exclaimed. "Where'd you learn to fight like that, mate?"

"From someone you better hope you never meet," Ed said, his mood darkening slightly. "Anyway…the other seats either have stuck up idiots-three fine examples bleeding on the floor out there-or are full. Do you mind if I stay here?"

"No, no. Not at all," Hermione said. She frowned. "Hey, didn't I see you in the hall an hour ago? I think I pointed you in this direction."

Ed scratched his head sheepishly. "Yeah, you did. I've got a talent for getting lost."

"No kidding," Harry said, raising an eyebrow. "If there's an award for getting lost, I wouldn't be surprised if you own several of them."

"Me neither," Ed agreed, sitting. He noted one of the people outside standing. "I'm going to have to bash their brains out or something, aren't I?"

He barely said the last word before the compartment door flew open. A bloody-nosed Malfoy was standing there. "I'm not done with you!"

Ed scowled up at him. "Yeah, well I'm done with you! So get a life and go away. Or don't get a life, and keep in mind that this is a moving train. I can always throw you out if you want me to." He promptly slammed the door closed, and put one foot in the small gap in the door where the opaque glass met the wood. He felt Malfoy try to open it again, and pushed harder. The door didn't budge.

"So…" he said, leaning back with a foot still keeping the door closed. "Feel like going away any time soon?"

There were several screamed words that included more than a few profanities. After a certain amount of time, and swearing about his foot and nose, Malfoy had to admit defeat to Ed's foot, and left.

The rest of the train ride was taken in general silence. The few questions that came up were directed at Ed. He just answered what he could, like the unimaginative but always asked "What's your name?", and said the rest was supposed to be explained later.

Ron and Hermione directed the first years, and the others wandered out after them. They paused at the train exit, and Harry said something about the obnoxious woman shouting for the first years being at his hearing. They passed by her and loaded on to some carriages, which were pulled by partially invisible horses. For whatever reason, out of the people in their carriage, only three people could see them.

When the carriages got them to school, the group he'd been with had gone to their tables. Ed hadn't really planned this far ahead, and he glanced up at the head table. Dumbledore caught the look and said something Professor McGonagall, who had been passing to put a hat on a stool. She nodded, dropped the hat off on the stool, and made her way between the students. She stopped a foot from Ed, speaking loudly to be heard above the clamor.

"Professor Dumbledore wishes me to tell you that you are permitted to sit wherever you want to at one of the four tables," McGonagall said. "You may want to find a spot before the first years take theirs."

Ed nodded to her as she walked away, and took one of the open spots by Harry and his friends.

Harry looked at him in surprise. "You're in Gryffindor? I've never seen you around here before."

Ed shrugged. "I was privately taught before. I transferred in this year." It was a story he and Dumbledore had made up, since it would be a bit awkward to explain that he 'had no idea who he was'. There were also documents-documents far from being authentic even though they looked it-that 'proved' it.

Harry blinked, and nodded.

A few minutes later, and the first years were settled into their seats. If Ed looked, he could see three familiar faces glaring at him. One had a broken nose. He smirked back, and soon after, Dumbledore began speaking. Halfway through, he got interrupted by a talking toad.

'_Honestly, as a Ministry official, you think she'd follow the laws,'_ Ed thought to himself. _'Or maybe she thinks she doesn't have to follow the laws of nature.'_

After blabbering some nonsensical words, she sat back down. Ed was sure he heard someone mutter, "Well _finally_."

The three beside him started whispering, and Ed heard the mention of waffles. He glanced at the table, and took note that the food wasn't out yet.

As a last announcement, Dumbledore said, "You will see him around the school, so we just want to clear up any confusion. Currently sitting at the Gryffindor table," he motioned to where Ed sat, and other students craned their heads to get a glance of him, "Ed is a transfer fifth year student who has been privately taught up till now. Since he may be leaving at any time, Ed won't be assigned to any particular House. However, for the time he _is_ here, Ed will have the role of a prefect. That is all." He continued on to dismiss everyone.

As they left, Ed began to notice the quick rise in conversation on one particular topic, and saw Harry stiffen. From what the Truth had showed him, it made sense for him to be worried or irritated about conversation, since it tended to focus around what he said and if it was bull or not. But then they became able to distinguish what was being said, and Ed felt a tick mark on his head as he realized they were actually talking about _him_.

"Privately taught? Do they even _allow_ that?"

"I don't think they do. And they're making him a prefect!"

"Totally unfair! _I_ wanted to be a prefect!"

"Although…I did hear that he punched Malfoy in the nose. Or at least throw him a few feet. I've heard both."

"Really? Wow. Maybe he punched him and_ then_ threw him."

"I know for sure he broke Malfoy's foot by slamming it in the door. I was walking past and heard him swearing."

"Hey, what did Professor Dumbledore say his last name was?"

"You know, I don't think he did…"

"What, does he not have one?"

"Well, if he was from the Black family or someone else with a bad history, I could see why he wouldn't want anyone to know."

"True…but does he _look_ like he's from the Black family?"

The next day, and unfortunately for Harry, Ed had been forgotten. People rushed to fill up on the gossip. Like it was going anywhere.

"So…" Hermione said, obviously trying to distract everyone from the conversations floating around. "How was everyone's summer?"

"It sucked," Harry said bluntly. He looked like he was going to add more before glancing at Ed.

Ed sighed, and said, "Pretend like I'm not here. I know about the Order."

Hermione let out a squeak. "You know about the Order? How?"

"Small things I picked up on." Ed shrugged. "I was here for a month and a half before school started."

Harry nodded, and said to Ed, "We actually were at the Order's headquarters for a week or so before we came here, so we all talked before now. But, why were you here early?"

Oh what the hell. He'd made up a good lie, so he might as well use it. "Dumbledore didn't use my last name because he doesn't know it," Ed started, and was interrupted by Ron.

"What do you mean, he doesn't know it?" Ron said irritably.

"Because the only who he knows that could've told him would be me. And _I_ have no idea who the hell I am, so that throws a problem in things," Ed said. He almost said 'wrench' instead of 'problem', but stopped at the last second. Waaay too much brain damage. "Professor McGonagall found me while I was trying not to fall off the roof. You never really appreciate how tall some buildings are before you're trying not to fall off them."

"What were you doing on the roof?" Ron demanded.

"Ron!" Hermione hissed. "He probably doesn't know!"

"What she said," Ed said, jerking a thumb at Hermione. "All I remember is my first name." He could get used to this lie. It certainly was easy to keep up, and there was definitely no one to contradict him. It wasn't like he was a world-famous State Alchemist here whose face and/or name everyone knew.

"And no one's heard of you? Or reported you missing?" Harry asked, frowning.

Ed shook his head. "Nothing. The other two school headmasters came over here for a while, and neither one recognized me. The Ministry knows and has been investigating. Nothing there either."

"Wow. Sorry, mate," Ron said, dropping off the offensive. "Hope you find out who you are."

Ed gave a wry smile. "Well, therein lies the problem. Your nurse here gave me something to drink to recover my memories, and since it didn't work, I'm either this way from a curse or shock. So it might be a bad thing if I do."

"And there's nothing they can trace you with? Have they tried the normal world yet?" Hermione asked.

"Nothing I can think of. And I think the Ministry wouldn't take a step into the normal world if they were held at wand point." He almost slipped again, but found saying 'wand' instead of 'gun' came easier from more than a month of practice.

"Speaking of wands, do you have one?" Harry said suddenly. "If not, you should try Mr. Olivander's store."

Ed rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "We went to his store because I didn't have one, and, er…I kind of accidentally lit it on fire. Several times. And what wasn't on fire probably wasn't flammable."

Ron laughed. "Nice."

"Yeah…so I'm not going to be taking Transfigurations or a few of the other classes," Ed said. He was quite happy about not being able to take Transfigurations. He probably would've lost it on the first day, and either yelled at the teacher or run out of the room to go destroy something.

"Huh…and you're not attached to any House, but you're a prefect?" Ron said. "How'd you work that one out?"

"The prefect thing is news to me. I was bluffing on the train. But since something might turn up at any time, I'm staying distant from the other students so I can leave easier," Ed said. He glanced at the three, and added, "I'm helping the Order of the Phoenix. That's why I'm talking to you three."

"So, what, you're supposed to be my bodyguard?" Harry snapped. Ed had heard he got particularly picky about this subject.

"Psh, no," Ed snorted. "If I were in your place, I'd be bitching at whoever tried to be my bodyguard. When they asked me to, I declined. No, I'm here to take the attention off you from Umbridge, and generally just piss her off."

"Nice job," Ron said, amused. "Sounds fun."

Ed grinned. "And you've only seen part of one of my rants with Malfoy."

"So, you're going to irritate a Ministry official?" Hermione asked, frowning. "Even if it takes the attention off Harry, the Ministry will be less likely to help you out with your memory."

Ed sighed. "Maybe. But by now, I'm either going to figure it out on my own or I never will. I don't like relying on people to help me. Besides, I don't bow to authority. I kick them in the face, and tell them to go to hell."

All three had to grin at that.

"So basically, for the three of you, when it comes to Umbridge…sit back and watch the fireworks."

* * *

a/n: The waffle comment was because Ron had said something like what Umbridge had said had been a load of waffle, and Hermione had said there had been important stuff in the waffle. Quick FYI. _{and her beta reader just happened to be eating waffles at the time...suspicious much?}_

Another thing. From an idea Tsuki gave me, I'm going to start a pwnage tally at the end of every chapter on this fanfic _{it was a good idea, I have to admit}_ (erm...thanks?) for Malfoy and Umbridge, since no one else really gets pwned epically all the time.

So Malfoy: 10. A lot more if you count every 'I, unlike you'

Umbridge: 1

_{Sekai: 6,984,008,652,955}_

Tsuki: Oh it's on now.


	5. Politics from the Prodigy

a/n: these first few are being posted one after another quickly because I already had all of them prepared, because my beta reader (Tsuki) wasn't able to check them because she was being lazy. Grr. Anyway, so these few are coming up fast, but the others will be slower. Anyway, on with the story since you don't want to listen to me blabbering. _{No, no we don't}_

Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter

* * *

During breakfast, they received their schedules. Ed didn't particularly care, but the other three seemed ticked at what they had gotten for Monday.

"Bad teachers?" Ed asked.

"You weren't paying attention, were you?" Ron sighed. "Yes, all four horrors. Binns, Snape, Trelawney, and Umbridge."

"Huh." Ed glanced at his schedule. "Well, lucky me, it looks like I got the same schedule as you. Snape I understand. Him and I have had our run-ins. Trelawney either goes all not-here-right-now-please-leave-a-message-after-the-following-disturbing-prophecy, or avoids me like the plague. Umbridge is going to be fun to piss off, and Binns insists on giving me lectures in the hallways. So I find myself agreeing with you on this account."

After Binn's classroom, and an awkward conversation with Cho, they found themselves sitting in Snape's classroom. There, the trio (not including Ed) got a shock.

There was _one_ student outside of Slytherin Snape didn't despise.

And that happened to be the only transfer student in the school.

The three weren't the only ones surprised when Snape gave him a brief congratulations when Ed's potion turned out perfect. Several people stared at Ed for several minutes with gaping mouths before Snape walked by them and thwacked the back of their heads.

When they hurried from the classroom, Hermione immediately turned to him and said, "What was _that_?"

Ed looked at her in confusion. "What was what?"

"Blimey, you didn't notice?" Ron said. "Snape _hates_ anyone but Slytherins! For him to congratulate you, is like…like…Hermione failing a test! It's impossible! The world's ending!"

"Well, the whole hating thing I got," Ed said. "Considering some people were practically swallowing flies. I told you I had my run-ins with him. At one point, we ended up debating which would be best in some potion, and…well…when I wasn't studying, I ended up testing out different ingredients in potions with him. We almost burned down his room in the process, too."

The three continued gaping at him.

There was a moment before Harry finally managed to say, "So…you two know each other? In a way that doesn't mean you're at each other's throats?"

"Yeah," Ed said. The three were still in shock half an hour later. It seemed like Ed seemed intent on shocking them, because when Ron complained after Divinations was over about their massive amounts of homework, Ed decided to announce he had already finished half the homework.

"Okay, that's it," Ron groaned. "I'm sorry, Hermione, but Ed's beaten you in who's worse when it comes to this sort of thing. As for you...Ed, that's...that's just unnatural."

Ed frowned. "Well, it was easy. And besides, if you'd been doing your homework during your other classes, you'd have some of it done too."

"You were doing homework during class?" Hermione frowned. "When?"

"When I finished the Dream Draught," Ed said. "And when Trelawney was avoiding me."

"Hope you don't mind if we use your notes. We'll probably end up stealing Hermione's anyway, but whatever," Ron said.

"You do that," Ed said, eyebrow raised in amusement. "Except I didn't take any notes. And besides, what is legible of my handwriting I have a bad habit of coding. So it wouldn't really make a difference."

Ron groaned. Harry said, "You code your writing? Why?"

"No idea," Ed said, putting a stop to the conversation. They arrived at Umbridge's room, and Ed put on a smirk. "Well, let's go piss off our teacher, shall we?" You could almost see the evil glint in his eyes and the hellfire behind him if you squinted hard enough.

A few minutes into the class, and Ed had achieved his goal. He later told them that Umbridge had practically set it up for him.

After she had walked in, she gave some sort of thing that probably was supposed to be a smile. "Good afternoon class."

"Yeah, I had one before I walked into your classroom," Ed muttered.

Umbridge flashed a look in Ed's direction. He didn't respond. After commanding them to say some crap back to her, she said again, "Good afternoon class."

"Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge," most of the class said in a monotone voice back to her.

Ed was, of course, the exception. "Well don't I feel honored to be here." He kept his voice hidden in the monotone, however. The nearby students hid their snickers.

Umbridge frowned at him. "I do not appreciate disobedience, Mr… I don't believe I know your full name."

Ed didn't answer her question, seeing as she hadn't directly asked it. "I believe whole-heartedly that you don't."

"What would be your full name?" Umbridge asked promptly.

Ed saw Hermione stiffen from the corner of his eye. Ed shrugged. "Ed until further notice."

"And what would that mean?" Umbridge sniped, glaring at him.

"It would mean that for one thing, you know why, and for another, your Ministry seems to be incapable of figuring it out."

Jaws dropped. Umbridge stiffened and tried to say something, but to the class's surprise, she left Ed alone and turned to the board. She ranted about how their previous experiences in that class had been bad, and she would 'fix' it.

She tapped the board and had them copy down what she had written as it appeared. This was when she attacked Ed. "Some of us should definitely pay attention to number two. Learning to recognize situations in which defensive magic can be legally used. One of these situations would definitely be to prevent… memory loss."

Despite the glare that shortly followed, murmurs broke out in the room. Ed didn't seem fazed at all. He raised his hand. "Now Professor Umbridge, whatever could you be talking about?"

Someone started snickering.

She glared at him, and focused back on the rest of the class. "Everyone, open your copy of _Defensive Magical Theory_. We will begin reading chapter one."

Hermione raised her hand, and Umbridge ignored her. It continued like that until Ed said, "Hey, are you going to ignore one of your students in dire need of an answered question in this astonishingly boring classroom?"

She turned around to face him. "I don't see your hand in the air."

"Well, when did I say it was mine?" Ed said, and didn't respond to the next thing she said. He looked up at the ceiling, and pointedly jerked a thumb at Hermione.

Within the next five minutes, there was a full blown argument going on that Ed _actually_ stayed out of. He instead chose to watch it like a ping pong match, as the other students threw forward contradictions to Umbridge's points. Finally, she took ten points from Gryffindor, and the class felt silent. Except for Harry. Umbridge finally gave him detention.

Ed frowned. He hadn't expected Harry to be _that_ stupid. He still had pranks to pull, damn it! So now he also stood. "So, let me clear this up, because apparently some of us have a bit of misplaced memory." Others looked shocked at how he so calmly criticized what was wrong with him. "Some guy may or may not be back-don't contradict that, I'm summarizing-and the Ministry is choosing to not follow this lead to find someone, an action that if done could save lives, judging from what the guy _had_ done. In other words, they're choosing their pride at not being wrong over doing the smart thing and following him?"

Umbridge gritted her teeth. "Detention."

Ed shrugged. "Fine by me. But you still haven't responded to my summary, which would be your job as a teacher, and as a 'friend', would it not be? Not to mention as a Ministry official."

A few quick grins were shared between other students and shot around the room. Ed really did know how to annoy someone.

"Mr. …" She paused, ticked that she couldn't use his last name. "Come here. You too, Mr. Potter."

Ed shrugged, and he and Harry walked to the front of the room to collect detention slips. Ed stopped short of her, and said, "You still haven't answered."

"There _is_ nothing to answer. There is no threat, because he never came back," Umbridge said, detention slip still outstretched.

"I didn't say he _was_, I said he _may_ or _may not be_. And besides, you already let one person slip away didn't you?" Ed said, bringing up another point. "Two years ago. Escaped from prison. Sirius Black."

The class felt silent again, and Umbridge stared at Ed. Then she glanced down and handed him another slip. "Another week's worth of detention."

"O-kay," Ed said, drawing out the 'o' in what was his usual arrogant manner. "I've made my point." He grabbed both slips, and strode from the room. The kids he passed could see he actually looked amused with what he had done. Of course, some kids were also still snickering, so that made up for it.

He and Harry walked down the hall. Ed broke the silence. "That was fun." He caught Harry's tense expression, and said quietly, "Sorry to bring him up. I know he didn't do anything. I was just pointing out that he escaped, and they didn't do anything about it. Well, _couldn't_. But past the first year of his escape, then they just didn't act."

Harry nodded at him. "Yeah. I know." They walked to McGonagall's office, who seemed ticked they had gotten there so quickly. Ed said he was only disappointed she hadn't responded. Then he could have insulted her more.

"Ed. If you ever want to find out who you are, you shouldn't be making enemies of her!" McGonagall snapped at him.

True, he probably should be keeping in mind that he was acting. But there was no way he was backing off. "Yeah, well, she's a bitch. And I don't suck up to her type."

McGonagall gaped at him briefly. Then, "Watch your language! ...Although I must say I agree with your attitude towards this."

Harry hid a laugh, and Ed grinned.

* * *

During their detention, Umbridge handed them both quills. "I want you to write, 'I must not tell lies'."

Ed looked confused, and stared at his quill while Harry took his seat. "Is something wrong?" Umbridge asked.

Ed glanced up at her. "Well, yeah. I mean, isn't that contradicting? Especially if this detention is over what we said in class and what you said back. So aren't you reinforcing us to talk back to you?"

Umbridge glared at him, and told him to take his seat. He shrugged, and complied. He wanted to see what the quill would do anyway.

Using his left hand, since it was easier to write with, Ed wrote some random sentence. There was a scratch on the back of his hand, and he heard Harry give a hiss of pain. Ed glanced down at his own hand, and saw 'I better get a promotion for all this' on the back of his hand. If he hadn't been ticked off at the blood he noticed on the paper, he would've snickered.

'_So…it uses blood.'_ Ed thought for a moment, and then switched which hand he was using. His right wasn't as good because of the automail, but his penmanship didn't really matter if he wasn't actually writing anything. Smirking, he continued.

When the detention ended, Umbridge had them show her their hands. Harry reluctantly stuck his out, and she examined the puffy skin. Ed folded his arms, not letting her go anywhere near him. She held out her hand persistently.

"Take off your gloves, please," she said, motioning with her hand. Ed didn't move. "Take off your gloves," she said, lowering her tone.

"Can't," Ed said. "Medical condition. The first time I tried…it didn't end well." Ed raised an eyebrow, practically daring her to argue.

"Well," she said. "Mr. Potter, you can go. Your friend and I will have a talk with Madame Pomphrey."

Harry glanced at Ed, nodded, and then left the room. Umbridge waited a moment, and then led Ed to the infirmary.

Madame Pomphrey looked up, and barely hid her expression of distaste when she saw who was leading Ed. "What are you here for?" She asked, attempting to keep her voice polite.

"I have a student who has a medical condition I would like you to see to," Umbridge said, pushing Ed forward. He didn't respond to the push and stood his ground.

Madame Pomphrey nodded at Umbridge, motioning for Ed to come forward. "What's the problem?"

"Well, it's…odd," Ed said, making a lie. "It's hard to explain." Knowing that she'd see anyway, he glanced pointedly at one of the curtains.

Madame Pomphrey nodded, and walked to one of he beds. Ed followed her, and Madame Pomphrey turned to face Umbridge. "I prefer to inspect my patients alone, if you wouldn't mind." Umbridge paused, and stopped. Ed sat on the bed, and Pomphrey drew the curtain. "Okay, now take off your glove."

Ed breathed a quiet sigh, and slipped off his glove. The metal gave off a dull sheen, reflected from the lights above. Despite who was standing outside the curtain, Pomphrey wasn't able to suppress the gasp. "Where to?" She said quietly.

Ed hesitated, and then tapped his shoulder where the automail met his arm. She nodded, and said he could put his gloves back on. When he did, Madame Pomphrey opened the curtain, and turned to Umbridge. "Yes, he has a medical condition. It would be best for him to keep his gloves on. Ed, I would like to check that once a week, if that's alright with you."

Ed nodded. Umbridge looked stiffly between the two, and then said, "Well, I'll leave you to it," and walked from the room.

Pomphrey looked back to Ed. "What may have made you lose your memory probably made you lose your arm. Is there anywhere else?"

Realizing that without Winry, he'd need someone else to prevent his limbs from rusting and falling off, he tapped his knee. "Just up to here."

She nodded. "And I assume they've been there this whole time and you haven't mentioned it?"

Ed sheepishly rubbed the back of his head. "Well…yeah."

Pomphrey sighed. "Any pains from them?"

"No."

"Any problems?"

"It's not fun with rain."

"I can put a spell on it to help against that. Anything else?"

"Sometimes the limbs do something, but I've worked out the kinks."

"Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall will want to know about this. Stay here, please," she said, and walked from the room. A few minutes later, and she returned with the two she had mentioned.

Ed barely glanced at them. He had his glove off, shirt sleeved rolled up, and pant leg rolled up. Both sets of automail were in plain sight. From the corner of his eye, he could see that both professors looked shocked.

"Can you take off your shirt so we can see the full extent?" Pomphrey asked, since Ed's rolled up sleeve could only go so far.

Ed sighed. From the Homunculi, he had more than one scar that probably would throw at least two of the already three shocked professors into a coma. But he took off his shirt anyway.

The three stared at him. He stared right back.

Pomphrey, out of medical curiosity, was the first to recover. "How well can you move your arm? From the scars by your arm, I'd say it's connected to the nerves."

"It seems like I can do anything with my arm people normally can," Ed said, bending his fingers. "And you're right. I think it's connected to the nerves."

"Who ever did this…was a genius. There's no other word," Pomphrey said, examining his arm.

Ed found himself agreeing. Winry _was_ a genius when it came to automail or anything she could take apart and put back together.

"What can we do about it?" McGonagall asked.

"Unfortunately, I doubt we can re-grow his arm," Pomphrey said. "I don't think there is anything we can do, since he says it doesn't hurt."

'_Of course, I probably won't tell you when it does.'_ It was a warm night, so it wasn't bothering him as much as it sometimes did, but in England the cold weather was really aggravating his arm.

Ed sighed. "Look, I'm fine. If we're done here, I'll drop by once a week," Ed said, slipping shirt back on. The three professors still looked worried. When none of them protested, he walked from the room.

* * *

The week of detentions wasn't being kind to Harry. Ed noticed that, and saw Ron's reaction when Harry accidentally showed the scratches.

"I thought you said she was having you write lines!"

"Well, technically she is," Ed said. "But speaking of the detentions, let me deal with her. It's actually quite amusing."

"Even after the detentions you're still saying that?" Harry snapped at him. "Lie low! This is my problem, not yours!"

"So? I'm making it my problem. And the detentions don't affect me as much as they do you," Ed said. "You should be the one lying low. If you have something you want to bitch at her about, pass it on through me."

"It doesn't affect you as much? What does that mean?" Ron asked suspiciously.

Ed glanced up at the painting of the fat lady, who was glaring at him. He said the password and walked through, the other two following. "I mean it doesn't affect me as much. Or, more correctly, it just doesn't affect me. It's boring as hell, that's about it."

"Quit avoiding the question!" Harry snapped. He was also getting suspicious about Ed.

"The medical condition," Ed said. "Look, if we don't tell Hermione, she'll also be ticked at us." Ed glanced back the way they had come. "Crap. Wrong way. I'll see you guys tomorrow." He vanished from the Gryffindor common room.

"There better be a good explanation tomorrow," Ron muttered angrily as he and Harry walked up to their room.

"Yeah, it better be," Harry agreed.

* * *

a/n: anyone notice that Ed knew the password even though he wasn't a Gryffindor? :P

Okay, previously had a little panic attack part here because this massive ice storm hit, and I thought the power lines would be out for days. Not the case, but whatever. Storm's way over.

Malfoy: 0/Total:10

Umbridge: 19/Total:20

Pleeeeaaassssseeeeeee review! _{or the bloodthirsty Tsuki will be released upon you. Muahahaha.} _I've gotten some really funny reviews so far, so keep 'em coming!


	6. Dodging Q and A's

Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist (Hiromu Arakawa) or Harry Potter (J. K. Rowlings) _{But Tsuki is awesome, so that has to count for something.}_

* * *

Ed had managed to avoid the three for the rest of the week, and part of the weekend. Finally, when the three were ranting about Percy, Ron's brother in the Ministry, Hermione caught sight of Ed and reminded them that Ed had wanted to tell them something.

Sirius chose that opportunity to appear in the fire, much to Ed's relief. The three beside him seemed anxious to seem him, and were soon caught up talking with him. Ed was ignored, and quite happy about it, only to be remembered by Sirius.

"We have an extra listener it would seem," he said, looking at Ed. "And I believe I recognize you from somewhere."

"Hanging off the side of the train," Ed said. "And it would seem I wasn't the only one who saw through your other form."

Harry was glancing in between the two. "You've met."

"Well, sort of." Sirius shrugged. "I saw him on the side of the train when it was passing. I'm guessing you're the Ed I've heard of?"

"Yeah. Dumbledore told you?"

"When I asked him what happened to the rules of the train that said to stay inside the train when it was in motion."

Ed snickered.

"Why were you on the side of the train?" Hermione frowned.

"If you recall my ability to get lost…" Ed said.

"Speaking of the train, you broke Malfoy's son's foot?" Sirius said, amused.

"And I think I broke his nose too when I threw him," Ed added. "Not to mention I insulted both Malfoys. Multiple times."

Sirius grinned, and then his grin faded. He sighed. "Sorry, but we still don't have any idea who you are."

Ed shrugged. "That's fine. I didn't think you would."

Sirius nodded, and went back to talking with the other three. After a while, he vanished from the fire. Ed also managed to slip out before any of the remaining remembered what they had been wanting to ask Ed.

* * *

A few days later, and they learned Umbridge would be grading the teachers. Ed hardly listened as the three friends bickered about this with some of the others.

The first class they had with Umbridge grading was Trelawney's. With Ed in the class, they had an odd number, so Trelawney worked with Ed.

"Now, what did you dream last night?" Trelawney asked.

"Er…" Ed said, glancing out of the corner of his eye at Umbridge. He didn't care if he disliked Trelawney, if it gave Umbridge points, he was against it. "Sorry, I didn't have time to write it down, but I had an odd dream last night…" He hurriedly began scribbling down in the Dream diary. Unfortunately, he had had a dream that night, and he was too busy thinking about what he was writing down to lie. "I dreamed I was walking on the streets of some city. Don't know where. Anyway, people either congratulated me about something or ran away. And there were two people who went with me… Neither of them spoke, but they were really happy about something. Here, details," he said, shoving the diary at Trelawney. She'd written down what he said, and read the short note he'd written in the diary.

Umbridge was looking in surprise at Ed, and didn't get a chance to look at the diary before Trelawney shoved it back at him. "Do you know why you continued? Or did you stop and ask anyone?"

"I didn't stop. And I don't know why I continued," Ed said.

Umbridge asked Trelawney to do a prophecy, and she looked up at her. "I see…you will be awarded for your deeds by the Minister," she spoke in a far away voice, and then looked around like nothing had happened. All the other students looked in surprise at her.

Umbridge gaped, and then closed her mouth, giving her a small nod before walking around the classroom.

Trelawney glanced at Ed, and gave a small nod. Ed grinned back, although it was partially forced. He'd seen Amestris as he had when they were storming Central. The few people who'd seen them had either fled because they knew of the fight that was happening, but didn't know the details, or knew Ed or anyone else with him and were cheering for them. Mustang and Hawkeye he figured were there because they were the ones who would profit the most from them winning the battle.

He felt a little heartsick as he realized this. And then he realized he had accidentally lied to Trelawney again. He did know why he'd kept walking. He knew why he continued. He had to continue, because that was what he did. He was the Fullmetal Alchemist, damn it. And no one would stop him from going back to the people he knew.

* * *

When the class ended, Ed met up with the other two, since Hermione was in Arithmacy. Ron was saying, "'You will be awarded for your deeds by the Ministry'? How did Trelawney get _that_? She must be a nut job."

"Or," Ed said, opening the diary to the page he had written on and passed it to Ron, "she can read."

Ron glanced down at the diary, and Harry peered over his shoulder. "Tell her she will be awarded for her deeds by the Ministry. She won't count you off if you praise her. Even if it's bull shit." Ron glanced back up at Ed. "This is what you were writing?"

"Yeah." Ed shrugged. "Even if we don't like her, it gives Umbridge something to work with if she can fire Trelawney. So I got Umbridge off her case."

Hermione smiled at him when they told her what Ed had done during their next class, Defense Against the Dark Arts. "Nice job, Ed."

Ed shrugged.

"Wands away," Umbridge announced. "As we finished chapter one last lesson, I would like you all to turn to page nineteen and commence chapter two."

Ed started to raise his hand, but Hermione beat him to it. Umbridge walked between the desks to come face to face with her when Hermione told her that she had already read chapter two.

"Well then, proceed to chapter three."

"I've read that too. In fact, I've read the whole book."

"What she said," Ed agreed.

"Well, can either of you tell me what Slinkhard says about counterjinxes in chapter fifteen?" Umbridge said stiffly.

"He says counterjinxes are improperly named," Hermione responded immediately. Ed left her to it. "He says 'counterjinx' is just a name people give their jinxes when they want them to sound more acceptable."

Umbridge raised her eyebrows, and Hermione added, "But I disagree."

"You disagree?"

"Yes, I do. Mr. Slinkhard doesn't like counterjinxes, does he? I think they can be very useful when used defensively."

"Oh you do, do you? Well I'm afraid it's Mr. Slinkard's opinion, not yours, that matters within this classroom, Miss Granger."

"So you don't want us to think for ourselves?" Ed asked, raising an eyebrow. He was leaning backward in his chair, arms folded by his head.

"Five points from Gryffindor for sitting improperly," Umbridge said, walking away. "And until you all need to, the Ministry can make decisions for you."

"Well," Ed said, not rectifying his position, "I'm sorry to say-not really-that the current people in the Ministry won't always be there. They'll either move on or retire. No one will know what to do, since they've had a lack of responsibility, and we'll pretty much screw ourselves in the next generation."

"Twenty points from Gryffindor for disobeying orders and improper use of language! Detention as well for talking back!"

"Well, it's not improper use if it's true." Ed glanced up at her. "And you do realize I'm not a Gryffindor, right?"

Umbridge's face turned red. She whipped back around and strode to the front of the classroom. "As an answer for you, I am here to use a Ministry-approved method that does not include inviting students to give their opinions on matters about which they understand little. Your previous teachers in this subject may have allowed you more license, but as none of them-with the possible exception of Mr. Quirrell who did at least appear to have restricted himself with age-appropriate subjects-would have passed Ministry inspection-"

The second Quirrell's name was mentioned, Harry scratched a note to Ed, deciding to consider what the other boy had told him to do. Ed glanced at it, and briefly raised his hand before dropping it again. Umbridge glanced at him, and tried to continue before Ed said, "We are talking about the guy who had Voldemort sticking out of the back of his head, right? Does that pass your Ministry inspections?"

"Detention!" Umbridge snapped at him. Harry flinched slightly, knowing that he actually should have been the one to take the punishment.

Ed rolled his eyes. "Jeez, thanks. Really appreciate you blaming me for something I'm saying truthfully, when last week you had Harry and I write lines that said, 'I will not lie'."

Umbridge gritted her teeth at him, and restarted her lesson. Ed smirked. He'd been a State Alchemist, and therefore a politician, for five years. Unless it was someone who knew him well (like Mustang, Al, or anyone who worked with Mustang) and was willing to politically spar with him (that was Mustang) there was no way he was going to be beaten in a verbal fight (that wasn't Mustang. At least, he didn't _think_ Mustang could politically beat him, when the two ignored who was higher ranked then who. Mustang usually just threw his rank at Ed to stop the debate, unfortunately).

Since the next class Harry, Ron, and Hermione had was Transfigurations, Ed was absent. They found him in their next class already there, talking with Professor Grubbly-Plank. Ed said something with a grin, and Grubbly-Plank laughed.

As the rest of the class gathered, Umbridge began moving among the students and asking them questions. Grubbly-Plank continued teaching her lesson, and at one point asked Ed to get something for her.

Umbridge walked up to Grubbly-Plank at that point. "Do you usually familiarize yourself so closely with your students?"

Grubbly-Plank shook her head. "Not usually. Ed was here for a month and a half before school started, so all the professors here-oops, sorry, you weren't here yet, were you?-know him quite well. Ask any of the other professors, and I think they'll agree with me that he's a delightful student. I enjoy his company quite a lot."

Umbridge frowned. "That's odd. He's given me a lot of trouble in my class."

Grubbly-Plank shared the frown. "I'm sorry to hear that. Although I have noticed that certain phrases or sentences can trigger a bit of an explosive reaction with him. He doesn't like to be talked down to, although it would be hard to even do that with Ed. He's extremely well-informed and mature for his age. Did you know he's read all the books at the school? Just within the first half month of being here?"

Umbridge blinked in surprise, and soon after the lesson continued on normally. Ed returned with whatever Grubbly-Plank had asked him to bring her. He didn't even glance at Umbridge when he passed her.

After the Care of Magical Creatures class was over, Hermione told Ed to come with them to the Gryffindor commons-he'd been avoiding them in case they started asking questions again-after he finished detentions. She said that she had something she wanted to talk to him and the others about.

Ed finished up his detention, and walked down the hall. Peeves flew over his head, singing some annoying song. Ed stuck his tongue out at the ghost, who laughed. "Oh, so the one with no memory has attitude. Fire away with your pranks. I'll just insult you more!"

"Hah! So says the one with no body!" Ed snapped back. Peeves paused for a second, and Ed walked past him to the Gryffindor common room. He said the random password someone had made up, and walked in.

Harry looked up at him, and immediately said, "Sorry, I should've taken that one." Ed shrugged it off.

"Here," Hermione said, pushing a bowl of…_something_ toward him. "Put your hand in this. It'll help," she said.

Ed glanced down. Actually, it was quite the opposite of what she had just said. Whatever was in the bowl would probably gunk up his automail until the end of time. Or until General Armstrong went a little overboard with her tank cannon firing.

"Er…it's kind of ironic how you all pester me for days on end about why I don't mind the detentions, and the only way you get the answer is because you try and help," Ed said, raising an eyebrow at the bowl. "Thanks for the thought, though."

Hermione frowned. "What do you mean?"

Ed sighed. Time to spill the beans. "Harry, you know how the quills use blood to write?" Harry nodded, also frowning slightly in confusion. "Well, I don't mind using the quills because they _can't_ use my blood."

"That doesn't make any sense, Ed. You haven't really told us anything," Ron said.

"Just laying down ground," Ed said, and irritably blew upwards. His bangs shot up momentarily before falling back down. "There _is_ no blood in my right hand. It's metal." Ed rapped his knuckles on the table, and it let out a metallic clink. "That's why the detentions don't affect me. I'm not writing anything."

Hermione gasped. "That's your medical condition! Why you have to stop by Madame Pomphrey!"

Ed nodded. "To make sure it's working correctly. Umbridge doesn't know. Dumbledore and McGonagall found out when the nurse told them."

"Bloody hell…" Ron muttered. "That explains a lot."

Ed sat in one of the chairs. "That's why I asked you to tell me what you wanted to say to Umbridge. It takes attention off you, and puts it on me. And actually, Hermione, you were wrong, in a sense. If I attract Umbridge's attention, she'll want to know who I really am."

"So, irritating her helps you?" Ron said. "That's ingenious!"

Ed grinned. "Modesty aside, yeah it is. Especially since if she talks to the other teachers, including Snape, they'll say I'm a perfectly nice student. So she'll definitely be curious as to who I am." He turned to Hermione. "What are we here for?"

Hermione blinked. "Ah, yes. I was thinking about Umbridge, and it's about time we take matters into our own hands."

"Poison?" Ron immediately suggested.

"Seconded," Ed agreed.

"No-"

"Darn," Ed sighed, but Hermione ignored him.

"-I was thinking today…I was thinking that maybe the time has come we just do it ourselves."

"Do what ourselves?" Harry asked.

"Well, learn Defense Against the Dark Arts ourselves," Hermione said. Harry glanced at Ron, who was staring at Hermione. But he looked like he was agreeing. Ed wisely stayed out of the argument that soon followed, and slipped out when none of them were looking.

* * *

"I'll just repair this," Harry said when the argument had ceased, turning to the bowl of murtlap tentacles he had accidentally broken by smashing it into a wall.

Hermione suddenly frowned. "Where did Ed go?"

The three glanced around. "Okay, not only is that kid freakishly smart, he's like a ninja or something," Ron said. At Harry's confused expression, Ron explained, "I only know about them because Hermione had me watch a movie with some Jackie Chan ninja guy."

Harry nodded. "Ah, him. But still, Ed?" He called, and no answer. "We should probably keep an eye on him. I mean, he's helped us a lot, but he also knows more than he should. It's suspicious, don't you think?"

Hermione nodded. "And Mr. Olivander couldn't get him a wand. That's definitely odd. But I think he just might have secrets. But also keep in mind that he also doesn't have memory of who he is."

Harry frowned. "Still…"

"Oh never mind," Hermione said, rolling her eyes. "I'll see you two tomorrow." She nodded to them, and the other two left for bed as well.

That weekend was a Hogsmeade weekend. Hermione had told Ed they were going to meet with a group of people to see if they also wanted to learn Defense Against the Dark Arts properly, and asked if he could help back them up.

He hesitated before saying, "Sorry, can't. Parent signature on the Hogsmeade slip, remember?"

Hermione flinched. "Right, sorry. We'll let you know how it goes."

Ed smiled, and nodded. "Thanks."

When they came back, he learned it had gone well. Until they saw the Educational Decree #24. Although they had no clue how she'd found out, they decided to continue. Hermione had to frantically motion for the kids from the other tables to not move toward the Gryffindor table, to avoid suspicion.

Ed and Hermione were the ones in History of Magic to notice Hedwig. Hermione poked Harry, and he slipped over from his seat to open the window to let the owl in. Binns didn't appear to notice or care.

Harry carried her back to his seat, and whispered to the other three that Hedwig had been hurt. Using the excuse that he wasn't feeling well, he left the classroom. History of Magic passed without his return. They left the classroom, and were standing outside during a break waiting for him when he reappeared.

Hermione said her theory she had shared with Ron and Ed. "Well, I was saying to Ron…what if someone had tried to intercept Hedwig? I mean, she's never been hurt on a flight before, has she?"

Harry frowned, as Ron asked who the message was from. "Snuffles."

Ron took the note from him. "'Same time, same place'? Does he mean-"

"Yeah, the next Hogsmeade weekend, at the Hog's Head. It was a smart move to leave, and then come back, Hermione," Ed said suddenly. The three looked at him in confusion, but then Hermione had realization dawn on her face as Ed tilted his head at the students milling around them. Anyone could be listening, and even saying that they were meeting someone in the fire would be suspicious.

"Yeah, it was. Thanks," Hermione said, stomping on Ron's foot when started to ask what they were talking about. "Later," she hissed.

Ron rubbed his foot, and scowled at her. She shrugged it off.

* * *

Malfoy: 0/Total: 10

Umbridge: 8/Total: 28

Review! _{Or Tsuki will eat all yo cookies.} _No! My cookies!


	7. One's Pwnage and Another's Revenge

a/n: there was supposed to be a point to this author's note. I have no idea what it was. When I remember, I'll tell you. _{She wanted to tell you that I'm awesome, btw.}_

Oh yeah! Most of this is direct quotes from the book. Some of the stuff is original because they're talking to Ed, but a lot of what seems to be direct quotes probably is. Just saying. I actually used the book. Yay me. _{*Thwacks with heavy book* And yet she still can't spell half these words correctly.} _Yes I can. Hush, insolent child.

Disclaimer. *sigh* here we go again. I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. So there.

* * *

They entered Potions class. Malfoy was talking obnoxiously loud from the top of the stairs. "Yeah, Professor Umbridge gave the Slytherin Quidditch team permission to play straightaway, I went to ask her first thing this morning. Well, it was pretty obvious, I mean, she knows my father really well, he's always popping in and out of the Ministry…It'll be interesting to see whether Gryffindor is allowed to keep playing, won't it?"

Hermione hissed a warning to the boys, but Ed ignored her. "Hey, Malfoy. You done gloating? The rest of us have lives to lead and ear drums to keep intact. Those of us who don't care about who got to keep their Quidditch team don't need you yelling at the top of your lungs, thank you very much. We get the message. You're an over-spoiled, obnoxious brat." Ed pushed past Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, to take his seat. He rested his chin in his palm, and closed his eyes like he was sleeping.

"What did you say?" Malfoy snarled at him. Ed didn't respond. "My father knows the Minister! You better watch your mouth about what you say!"

"What does your father's position have to do with your last sentence?" Ed asked, slightly opening one eyes to look at Malfoy.

"He can have you kicked out of this lousy school!" Malfoy shouted at him.

"I'd like to see him try," Ed said. He closed his eye again, and said without another motion of acknowledgement, "Hello, Professor Snape."

"Ed," Snape said with a nod at the blond 'sleeping' in his seat. "It's nice to see _someone_ is smart enough to be doing what they're supposed to be doing," he added pointedly, shooting a look at the kids crowded outside the doorway.

They hurried in.

The next few days passed without incident. Harry began teaching some real Defense Against the Dark Arts. Ed had protested against the name 'Dumbledore's Army' in case they were caught, because then the blame would fall to Dumbledore. He ended up being ignored, but later convinced Hermione to at least let him carry the paper with all their names on it. When she asked, he said he could destroy it the fastest. Hermione came up with the fake galleons so they could all know when the next time was. Ed didn't actually participate, but read the books that were in there. Harry and Ron patronized Ed about saying the 'those of us who don't care about who got to keep their Quidditch team' comment, but Ed got them off his back when he told them he'd just been annoying Malfoy.

It was after the first Quidditch game that things started to go askew again.

Malfoy strode up to Harry, who had caught the snitch, when Ed hurried onto the pitch knowing instinctually that something was going wrong. He wasn't actually allowed on, but he'd gotten used to sneaking around without anyone knowing he was there. He got there in time to hear, "But we couldn't find any rhymes for fat and ugly-we wanted to sing about his mother, see-we couldn't fit in useless loser either-for his father, you know-but you like the Weasleys, don't you Potter? Spend holidays there and everything, don't you? Can't see how you stand the stink, but I suppose when you've been dragged up by Muggles even the Weasley's hovel smells okay-"

Harry was restraining George, while Angelina, Alicia, and Katie were all holding Fred back.

Ed, however, had had enough. He grabbed the back of Malfoy's robe, and started dragging him along. The others watched them, the Weasleys stopping their struggle. "Okay, you little twit, first of all, you've gone and pissed me off. Second of all, go screw yourself. And third of all, and probably the most important…" Ed dropped Malfoy, and turned back to the others. He helped the Weasleys up, and waved them all off the Quidditch pitch. He turned back to Malfoy, the others still intently keen on what Ed was going to say. "At least their father isn't having an affair."

Jaws hit the floor. Nobody standing there had seen _that_ coming.

Ed continued, "Oh, you didn't know about that, did you?" He pretended to examine Malfoy's shocked face. "Well, it was kind of obvious, you know. Why did you think he was always going to the Ministry?"

He turned back around, and walked past the Gryffindors. They stared after him, and then followed quickly.

"You!" Malfoy launched himself after Ed, who barely had to turn to dodge as a fist flew widely past his face. "You little-"

"Don't call me small, damn it!" Ed yelled back. He slapped aside another punch. "And you seriously can't fight worth shit, so stop insulting me and get some damn lessons!"

A whistle blew, and Madam Hooch strode toward them. "What's going on here?" She yelled at them.

"He insulted my father!" Malfoy yelled, turning back around to face Ed.

Ed was gone. Even the other Gryffindors were looking around for him.

"Where did that little brat go?" Malfoy yelled, and tried to storm off. Madam Hooch stopped him, and gave him a punishment for his behavior. When Malfoy retaliated by saying Ed had started it, McGonagall dropped in.

"Ed is not allowed down here, seeing as he's a spectator," she said. "I don't know who you were yelling at, but it wasn't Ed. In fact, he's right there." She pointed to where Ed and Hermione sat.

"He's good," Fred muttered softly to George, who nodded solemnly in agreement. He'd dragged Malfoy, told him off, and slipped away to let the blame fall on Malfoy. In all, Malfoy had just been dissed; epic pwnage, courtesy of Ed.

"How did he get up there?" Malfoy shouted in confusion.

"I don't know, but you still have your punishment," Madam Hooch said sharply. "This way," she said, and continued ranting at him as she led him over to Crabbe.

The Gryffindor Quidditch team exchanged looks in the changing room.

"That kid…" Angelina said. "I've never seen anyone tell Malfoy…well…I've never seen anyone put him to shame as well as Ed just did. He's got some mouth."

"Have you seen him in Umbridge's class?" Harry snorted. "He's even better then. I'm surprised Ed hasn't forced Umbridge to resign."

"You know how something always happens to our DADA teacher, and they don't come back next year?" Ron said. "Well, Umbridge might not be able to come back because she's suffering from Ed syndrome. AKA, you go crazy because he's freakishly smart and sharp-mouthed and can contradict your every move, so you end up some paranoid old idiot." Even Ron was in better spirits from Ed's ranting.

"Yeah, what he said," Harry agreed, drying his hair off. He and Ron ran from the changing room to catch up with Hermione and Ed. They found them both in the Gryffindor common room, where a party was being held for the Gryffindor Quidditch members.

When everyone finally went to bed, Harry and Ron turned to Ed. "What the hell was _that_?" Ron said the second the coast was clear.

Ed shrugged. "Exactly what it looked like." He paused. "Don't tell Malfoy this, but his father actually isn't having an affair. As far as I know."

"What?" Hermione squeaked. "You disappeared for a minute, but you didn't say where you went. You were the source of the commotion?"

"You should have seen him!" George said suddenly, appearing over Ed's chair. Fred was beside him. "Malfoy was insulting our mother, and then he continued on to our father, and then Ed stormed out of nowhere and dragged him and hauled him off!"

"Best bloody moments I've ever seen!" Fred crowed. "Malfoy got dragged off and screamed at _and_ had to take the blame because Ed made an escape!"

"_What _did you do?" Hermione said, practically shouting at Ed. He motioned for her to keep her voice down, but he was grinning.

"Exactly what they said." Ron jerked a thumb at the twins. "Ed took Malfoy apart like a pro."

After a while more of congratulating Ed, the twins slipped back into bed. Ed ended up taking a chair in the commons, since it was way past the time he was supposed to be back in his room. Hermione wasn't able to wake him when she, Harry, and Ron left to go visit Hagrid when they saw him come back.

* * *

Two days after and they headed out to Hagrid's for his lessons. He led them into the forest, where Malfoy started to freak out.

Ed finally told him that if he felt like he wasn't up to shutting up, he could always leave the group and run back the way they'd come screaming his head off like a little girl. Then he added that oh wait, he already _was_ screaming like a little girl.

Malfoy shut his mouth.

After several more minutes of trekking, and they came to a clearing. Hagrid called whatever he was waiting for, and they waited several minutes. Finally, one of the black horses with wings Ed and Harry had seen pulling the carriages came out from the cover of the trees.

"Oh, an' here comes another one!" Hagrid said when a second appeared. "Now…put yer hands up, who can see 'em?"

Harry raised his hand, as did Neville. Hagrid wasn't surprised by Harry, although he was by Neville. Ed reluctantly also raised his hand. Hagrid glanced at him in surprise. "An' you can see 'em too?"

Ed nodded, and Malfoy decided to ask what they were seeing. Except with more idiotic language usage. Hagrid motioned to the carcass that was being eaten.

He called on Hermione to answer why some people were seeing them and most weren't.

"The only people who can see thestrals, are ones who have seen death," Hermione answered. Ed glanced at the thestrals. Well. He'd certainly seen enough to see them, then.

Umbridge unfortunately made her presence known around that time. She began questioning Hagrid and the students, and Hermione ended up with tears of anger in her eyes. Ed was losing it, too.

Umbridge walked to Ed, making notes on her clipboard. She looked at him. "So you can see the threstrals?"

Ed snorted. "Obviously. Or did you just now realize that?"

Umbridge shot him a glare that was particularly wimpy, and Ed didn't respond. "Whom did you see die?"

"None of your business," Ed replied smoothly. "I'm not the one being graded here."

"Oh, but I am quite interested now, Mr. …" Again, Umbridge scowled as she realized she couldn't use his last name, and there was no way she was saying Mr. Ed.

"Well I guess that's just too bad for you. Anything else you want to ask?"

Umbrdge scowled, and motioned at the threstrals. "What do you think of them?"

"They're amazing creatures," Ed said. "Interesting adaptation. Not many people see death, so it's definitely helpful."

Umbridge frowned. She'd just gestured to some animals ripping a dead carcass apart. She'd expected a different reaction. "So, just who again did you say you saw die? It will definitely help my job."

Way too personal. "Professor Umbridge," Ed announced. Hagrid stopped his lesson, and Umbridge looked up at him from her clipboard. Ed's eyes were cold, and there was no hint of the usual teenage arrogance in him. Hell, he looked downright scary to more than half the students. "If you wouldn't mind, you are disrupting the class, and therefore cannot give proper judgment. I think you would find your time spent more wisely elsewhere."

The class gaped at him. He'd confronted Umbridge, even now that she had more authority than any of the other teachers.

She tried to stutter out a logical answer. "D-d-detention!" she finally snapped.

"I already have it. Since you have been inspecting the other teachers, I must ask if you have inspected yourself. If not, be sure to take points from yourself for being unable to come up with punishments other than lines, which we can both say has not worked in the slightest as of yet. And I doubt it will," Ed said, still cold. The ones standing around him were slowly backing up, not wanting to get caught in the cross-fire.

She continued to try to make her stutters make sense.

"And frankly, if you are taking points off for his speech," Ed motioned to Hagrid, "Take some off your own as well. I doubt any one here can even begin to understand what you are saying. Leave."

Umbridge had been shocked into disbelief. "_Now_," Ed added tersely. Umbridge stumbled from the clearing.

Hargid gave a low whistle, and an appreciative nod to Ed. Ed gave a small smile back, and redirected his attention to the threstrals.

The class continued, but not with much attention given to Hagrid. Slytherins gave glares at Ed, who listened aptly to Hagrid. The Gryffindors gave him grins and thumbs up.

When the class ended, Ed departed from the other students as fast as possible. He was halfway to the castle when people were emerging from the forest. Hagrid turned to the trio from Gryffindor. "So tha' was who you were talking about?"

"Yeah. Ed's got quite the mouth," Harry said, raising an eyebrow. "I've never seen him do anything like that however. He…just…"

"Ordered her?" Hermione suggested. "Although anyone in her position would have done the same thing. That look on Ed was…scary. I think he just lost it with her. He hasn't liked her ever since she came here, and he's attacked her every chance he got. Maybe he just had enough. Although, he really didn't want her to know who he saw die."

"Well, eit'er way, you've made yerselves some friend," Hagrid said. "An' he could see the threstrals."

"Yeah. He didn't mind them, either," Ron added. "What _do_ they look like?"

Harry and Hagrid described the animals. Ron raised his eyebrows. "And he wasn't affected? Huh…"

"Thank 'im fer me, will ye?" Hagrid said. "I've 'eard of 'im from some of the other professors. Friendly wi' all of 'em, 'cept the one who jus' left."

"That's what Grubbly-Plank said when Umbridge asked her," Ron said, frowning slightly. "She said he'd been here a month and a half before school started, so he got to know all the teachers."

"Yeah. And at the last Quidditch match, Malfoy started insulting the Weasley's parents, and Ed took him out," Hermione threw in, "from what I heard from all the Gryffindor Quidditch players. Every single one of them. Several times."

" 'Took him out'?" Harry snorted. "You mean more like took him apart. He dragged him off the field, swore at him, ticked him off, and slipped away when he attacked. Malfoy got in trouble, and Ed got off clean."

"Well, you've got anot'er person at yer back, 'arry," Hagrid said. "Does 'e know about…"

"Yeah. Said he figured it out on his own," Ron said.

"We better get going," Hermione said, glancing up at the backs of the last students to leave, who were already most of the way to the castle. "See you, Hagrid."

"You too," Hagrid said, and the four parted ways.

* * *

Malfoy glanced at Crabbe and Goyle. It was the day after Ed had snapped at Umbridge. And they were getting payback.

Malfoy was _not_ a happy camper after Ed had insulted him, his father, and Umbridge, on more than one account. He was becoming even more annoying than Potter. He wasn't sure how Ed had managed it, but he had: he'd gotten under Malfoy's skin, and was more irritating than anyone he knew. Little idiot thought he could get away with anything just because he had no memory.

Well they were changing that. He'd crossed the line. And they were getting payback.

* * *

Ed raised an eyebrow at what was in front of him, and stopped. He glanced around, trying to see if anyone was missing a big, random box that was rattling. He sighed. What the hell was he supposed to do with it?

Sighing again, he started toward it. Instead of opening it, he began to walk past it to report a missing box to Dumbledore.

As he walked past it, the rattling increased. Something in Ed's mind connected, and he realized it wasn't a random box. For one thing, there was a sliver of platinum hair around the corner watching him, waiting for what was going to happen. For another thing, the box was growing stronger because of him.

A line from a book he'd read during his time at the school came back to him. _Bogarts are strongest when people have strong fears. On rare occasions, they can even escape their enclosure._

The box rattled again, and forms exploded out of it. Ed slammed his eyes closed, not wanting to see what was going to happen.

* * *

From the corner, Malfoy, wand raised, watched in shock as the box opened by itself. _'It's not supposed to be able to do that! Unless...'_ He looked at Ed. _'Unless the fears are strong enough.'_ He smiled. Ed was definitely getting what he deserved.

Then the smile vanished. Wait. What..._was_ that?

* * *

The Gryffindor trio walked around a corner, talking. "We'll ask Ed when we next see him. But don't pry, okay?" Hermione said. Ron irritably nodded his head, and so did Harry. Hermione froze in her path, staring at what was ahead.

"What is it?" Ron asked. Raising a shaky hand, Hermione pointed ahead of them.

* * *

It was chaos. His eyes were open a sliver, but he still tried to force out what he was seeing. Even as he acknowledged his fears, more appeared. Everything he'd ever feared during the war.

Dead. Dead bodies, littering the floor around him. Dead friends, dead strangers...all dead. Above them, he saw flashes of alchemy. No visible form, but he didn't need one to know what the small glimpses of spikes or the red cloak meant. It was him, killing. And on the other side of 'him', was the Father, creating the massive Philosopher's Stone. Only, none of them were able to stop him this time. Hohenheim's attempt failed, and they saw the country they knew die. Among the dead, he saw a blackened, disfigured body. No, it wasn't a body. It couldn't be called something like that. It was a failure.

Every battle he'd fought with the Homunucli, relived again. Only, each ended in disaster. Again and again, everyone he knew died. Over and over. He saw Wrath's eye, Greed taking Ling's body, Pride's shadows, Gluttony swallowing him and Ling, Lust stabbing Hughes, Sloth attacking Briggs, Envy's grin...

Wait. Ed focused on that one thought. Envy's grin. That wasn't possible. Envy was _dead_. Mustang had killed him. Violently and all over the place. He'd seen it.

Ed's eyes narrowed angrily. He pictured what he had seen of Mustang's battle. Him burning Envy alive. The Homunculi dying.

The boggart, confused, briefly showed what he pictured. Ed snapped his head up, and focused on it. He remembered killing Pride, defeating the shadows. He remembered Lust's remains, and Al's recount of what had happened. He remembered Pride devouring Gluttony. He remembered Greed giving them his aid, however pompously he put it. He remembered Wrath, barely standing, and Scar attacking him in what everyone knew would end in success. He remembered no aid had come to the Father, proving Sloth's defeat. And he remembered punching the Father's ass down, and killing the thing that had tried to kill everyone that meant something to him.

Ed glared around him. "I've got you, you son of a bitch."

* * *

McGonagall looked up from her teaching as an anxious student ran into her classroom. "Professor McGonagall!"

"Is this important?" McGonagall asked in a no-nonsense tone.

The out-of-breath girl nodded. "Someone...let loose a boggart in the hallway. Ed's...standing there...it's bad."

McGonagall narrowed her eyes, and strode out of the room. She walked briskly down the hallway to where the girl pointed her. She saw Malfoy hiding in the hallway in front of her, peeking in a scared manner at what was happening. He wasn't the only one. Other kids were gathering, watching in horror at what was going on.

McGonagall turned, and stopped.

This wasn't like anything she'd ever seen.

Dead bodies, everywhere. Flashes of what seemed to be electricity flew over them, along with a red cloak. Eight beings, fighting...Ed? Yes, Ed. He was using a strange sort of fighting style, but it was working. He didn't appear to be using a wand, but he was doing some sort of magic. He wasn't the only one fighting. Other people were fighting with him... but it wasn't working. Whatever they attacked the beings with, the beings re-healed and killed them. The same people, dying over and over in different battles.

She knew enough about boggarts to know that for the blood and gore to be pictured this clearly, it was memories. Or something elaborated from memories.

Ed was standing in the middle of everything, looking down. But he seemed intently aware of what was going on. Suddenly, something perked his curiosity. He looked up, and looked at one of the beings grinning. He glared at it. "I've got you, you son of a bitch."

McGonagall's eyebrows rose in surprise. Was he talking to the being...or the boggart?

With sudden clarity, the beings began dying. The inhumanely attractive being was burned to death by one of the people. Another person snatched the head of a being, and blood spurted from the being with swords. A huge person was run through with a spike repeatedly. The child being was destroyed by Ed, leaving a small form. The fat being was eaten by the child. A grey being smirked at Ed and a few other people, apparently making some sort of alliance. The grinning figure was burned to death as well, by the same person as the first. And someone who had a slight resemblance to Ed was punched again and again, finally falling and not rising.

A spark of electricity flew over the bodies. They began to rise, brushing themselves off. Some turned and walked away without another glance, while others exchanged words with each other, or waved at Ed. The man who had burned two of the beings walked to the person in the red cloak, and said something indiscernible. Almost immediately, the flashes of blue lightning stopped. A white spot appeared by the body that was horribly disfigured, and absorbed it before disappearing.

All that was left was the battles. The excess people left, but nothing was stopping the battles. The people fighting with Ed died over and over, only to stand and die again.

Ed glared around the battles. "Fuck off," he said. There was a slight pause in the fights. "We won those battles. Now get your shit and leave."

The boggart gathered itself, and slunk into the box. Ed stalked past it, and angrily kicked the box closed. He approached the crowd, and it parted. Ed shot a glare at Malfoy. "Having fun?" He snarled, malice dripping from his words. Further ignoring the platinum, he strode away from the scene, on-lookers anxiously looking at him.

"Back to your classes," a high pitched voice said. McGonagall turned to see Umbridge herding kids away from the scene. McGonagall began doing the same, trying to move kids away.

As the last kids departad, McGonagall called Malfoy and his friends back. She glared equally between each of them. "A month's worth detention, each of you. What you did was ridiculous, and irresponsible. I have _never_ seen anyone in my years of teaching here act as horribly as you three just did. Report to Professor Snape at once." The three sulked, and slouched off.

Umbridge approached her. "I think a month's worth is a bit harsh." The boys began to perk up, before McGonagall cut off their hopes.

"No, it isn't, unless we just saw different things. If anything, that's being lenient," McGonagall said sharply. "Perhaps Ed was right. Some things are best not remembered."

Umbridge glared, but found she couldn't do anything without being suspicious. She walked irritably off.

McGonagall spent the rest of the afternoon searching for Ed. She had a ghost fill her position while she looked. It was rare for McGonagall to be this worried about a student, but then, it was rare, if unheard of, for someone's fears to be so acute and massive and reasonable that a boggart was able to free itself. And then for the person who freed it to beat it back. _Without a wand_.

But she finally had to stop, due to one problem: Ed was nowhere to be found.

* * *

a/n: the 'line from a book Ed had read' wasn't a quote. I made it up. I don't even know if it's possible. Sorry this part was serious. This was just something I needed to make later stuff make more sense. I know he didn't actually see Lust attack Hughes, but he knew what happened. So he could probably imagine it, or at least make a good guess.

Ed kicking the boggart's ass without a wand. Okay, I'm not really sure if that's possible, but since Ed has no wand, and it makes sense (to me, at least) for him to be able to do that, what I say goes.

Anyway, enough of my explaining. Thanks for reading, and please review!

And…

Malfoy: 15/Total: 25

Umbridge: 11/Total: 39

Oh crap. Someone mentioned that I forgot to say what these tallies are. Sorry about that. These are my pwnage tallies of how badly they get pwned. Since it's mostly Malfoy and Umbridge, they're the only ones with tallies.

Don't expect mine to be entirely accurate. _{They aren't} _For epic pwnages, I add points. _{The more epic, the more credit we give them!}_


	8. Loud and Silent Fuming

a/n: I finally found my damn thumbdrive! I am sooooooo sorry to those of you who knew this chapter was coming and never saw it posted for so long! Basically, I lost my thumbdrive, which had this chapter on it, and I was too lazy to write it back up, so I couldn't post until I found this! That, and for whatever reason my computer's messed up so I can't put it onto fanfiction unless it's coming directly from a thumbdrive. And why the hell did my cat take it from my dog? And why did my dog have it in the first place? O.o. (I happened upon an *epic* battle, in which my dog had the lanyard of my thumbdrive in her teeth, and my cat was trying to steal it from her. I took it from my dog. Obviously.)

Okay, moving on. This is another inserted chapter, blah blah blah…

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. So there.

* * *

Ed slipped through a few more hallways, leaving the growing crowd behind. No one was following him, and everyone was instead standing around the captured boggart in shock, or trying to figure out why everyone was staring at a box.

He made it to the Forbidden Forest before he heard the sounds of a search party of people looking for him. He threw a smirk in their direction, and then was gone.

* * *

"What happened?" Neville asked. Harry and Ron were sitting in their room with their roommates.

"We came around the corner, but we saw a boggart around Ed… Rumors are that Malfoy released. The teachers are _really_ pissed at him," Ron explained. "No one's seen Ed since he left the scene. McGonagall and a few other teachers are still out looking for him, but I don't think they're going to find him."

"Why not?" Seamus asked.

"Before school started, Ed stayed here for a while. The teachers would have to go on a full-out search of the castle to find him if they wanted to talk to him. He knows the school better than they do from sneaking around it," Harry said. "He won't be found unless he wants them to find him."

"So, we sit back and wait?" Neville clarified.

"Pretty much. There's nothing we can do for now."

* * *

"No sign of him, Minerva?" Dumbledore asked.

"Nothing. We can't find him." McGonagall sighed. "The students are getting edgy. The few who saw the boggart are terrified, and a lot went up to Pomphrey's for something to ease it."

Dumbledore frowned. "I didn't see the boggart. What did it look like?"

McGonagall gave a brief explanation. "He beat it without using a wand. I didn't even know anyone in this school could perform something like that. Another thing that's bothering me, is at one point, he said, 'We won those battles'. How did he know that?"

Dumbledore's frown deepened. "We will have to ask him when he returns. Has anyone looked in the Forbidden Forest yet?"

McGonagall paled slightly. "You think he went in there?"

"It's a possibility. After the boggart, he may have wanted to move his surroundings. He hasn't gone into the Forbidden Forest, as we know of, except with classmates. He also knows no one in the school would try looking for him in there," Dumbledore explained. "The Forbidden Forest is a reasonable guess."

"But he could get away from us easily in the school. He managed to do so for a long time during the summer," McGonagall said.

Dumbledore gave a slight shrug. "What he saw may have struck a memory. Or all of them. He may not want to be here anymore. It's just an idea, though."

* * *

_'Why the hell am I in here again?' _Ed scowled, whacking aside another branch. He paused, and looked up at the tree that was attached to the branch he had whacked away. Halfway up the tree, two branches crossed to form a perfect sitting spot. He smirked, and started to climb.

Less than a minute later, and he was fifteen meters off the ground, debating with himself again. After a while of arguing why he was there, his mind fell into sullen silence. Then his thoughts drifted to the boggart, and what it had shown. The boggarts showed the greatest fears of the person in front of it. He'd already suspected his would be his friends dying. It had irritated the hell out him to have his fears broadcast, but that wasn't what he was particularly worried about. They were all fine, he knew that. Between his teacher, Al, Mustang, and everyone else he knew, they would all live without him there. True, he was a good fighter, but they had fought and won their own battles on their own, and they also didn't have Homunculi to worry about now. Drachma wasn't particularly a worry anyway, what with Briggs doing some serious ass-kicking.

No, what really irritated and worried him was that his cover had just been blown to all hell. That was the only way he had been avoiding suspicion worse than what he already had. Now his memories, however twisted they had become, had been announced. And he had partially admitted to remembering. So, there went cover. Hopefully no one would pick up on it, and linger on what they had seen. And if they were wise, they wouldn't ask about what they had seen.

If he went back at all. He hated the school. It was boring, their classes made no sense, there wasn't anything for him to do but read (and he had already read through the library more than five times), the teachers irked him with their superiority issues (not that he didn't have any of his own), and the Ministry person was beginning to bore him yet irritate him at the same time. (Couldn't she figure it out already? She wasn't going to beat him with words. He had way more experience in that area than she did. And besides, she'd used the same arguments over and over, and it was becoming too easy to toss them aside and rip the apart.)

But it wasn't like he could stay in the forest forever. True, he'd survived off hunting before, but that had been during training. And he'd had Al to help him. Al was in another dimension.

He couldn't leave the school crowds either. It was an island, and yes he could swim, but he didn't plan on swimming for a day or so to get to land. (How far away _was_ another body of land? A few minutes? Hours? Days?) Even if he managed to get away, the Ministry would try to track him down, and probably would succeed. However, this was Ed. He'd escaped from people chasing him before. So, assuming he got away, the next thing he'd have problems with would be fitting in. He'd just gotten used to the witch and wizard's way of doing things, but they had said that the 'muggles' were oblivious to magic. So he couldn't mention any magic or use it as leverage. Also, alchemy and alkahestery weren't known, or known only vaguely and badly. Which meant they had focused on something else. Perhaps technology. But he would be so far behind, not to mention that it was about a hundred years past Amestrian time, that he wouldn't be able to survive, most likely. Not to mention money currency.

Options?

A) Go back to school, and get mentally tortured to death by school work and annoying teachers. B) Somehow get off the island, and probably get run over by some new technology. C) Stay in the Forbidden Forest until eaten or until killed by starvation. D) Go back to the school, explain what's really going on, and then explain the meaning of 'taking no shit from anyone'. E) Figure out better plan than shitty ones already though up.

Ed found himself agreeing strongly with plan E.

Ed heard the sound of thundering hoods, and looked below and around himself. Off to one side, he saw a herd of centaurs passing by. He leaned back, and didn't pay them anymore attention.

Until one of them spotted him.

"Over there! Human!" A centaur yelled out, and the herd turned to circle around the tree. Ed sighed. Did he have a big arrow over his head that said, 'Trouble, get over here now' or something?

"What are you doing in here?" One centaur demanded. "Spying?"

"If I was spying, wouldn't I be reporting to someone?" Ed pointed out. "Nah, I'm not spying. I'm hiding from the idiots back in that general direction." He waved back to the direction he was pretty sure he'd come. Or…had he come from the other direction? "Well, from somewhere. I'm not actually all that sure where I am."

"Do you think we're idiots?" The first centaur snapped.

"Well, no. You're smarter than humans, at least." Ed shrugged. "At least you don't go to war with each other in useless battles over something stupid every half a day and get yourselves killed." And Ed wasn't _at all_ thinking of Drachma. No, not at all…

A few centaurs shifted. Apparently no one had something like that before.

"Who are you?" A different centaur shouted out. "Why are you hiding from the other humans?"

Oh screw it. He was tired with the memory excuse anyway. "I'm Edward Elric. I'm hiding from the other humans because one of them set something off, and it'd be best if I stayed away from the rest of them."

"What?"

"A bastard set off a boggart in front of me. The ones who saw it shouldn't have seen some things for their sanity." Ed scowled. "And I am _not_ going through with endless rounds of questions again."

" 'Again'?" The first centaur asked. "Explain your story further."

"That's just about it. The 'again' comes from the fictional story I told about losing my memory. They tried to wake my memory by asking a bunch of questions. They didn't get anywhere."

"Why did you tell them a fictional story?"

"They wouldn't believe the truth. They're too dense. Too lost in their comfort zone. I mean, honestly, they don't even believe a serial killer's out to kill them again, even after someone reported seeing him while holding tons of proof?"

The centaurs were really uncomfortable by then. Not to mention the strange story Ed was telling them, he was also insulting his own race, and sitting unconcernedly with a bunch of arrows pointed at him by centaurs.

"So what is the truth?" The first asked.

"Got dimensionally lost." Ed shrugged, like people getting dimensionally lost happened all the time. "Can't get back for now, so I'm stuck here until further notice."

The centaurs apparently decided that line of questioning was going nowhere, and a few had begun to lower their bows.

"You're the first human we've met to insult your own race," The first centaur said slowly.

"Well, we've had it coming for a long time. Especially that Umbitch. If I weren't trying to keep a cover, I would've thrown her out a window by now." Ed blinked. "Oh yeah, my cover _was_ just blown… Heheh. She better watch her back." Ed let slip an evil grin along with the evil laugh.

"Are you referring to the Ministry woman?" The third centaur asked.

"Yeah, her. She lost her marbles. So has just about everyone else in the Ministry. Well, except for the spies in there," Ed replied.

"You don't like her? Even though she helps run your government?" The second centaur asked.

"I don't think anyone in the school _does_ like her, even the ones who tail along behind her. And no way in hell is it my government." Ed's voice became a snarl, although it wasn't directed at the centaurs. "If I choose to follow any government, or listen to any government, it's the Amestrian one. And I think the only time where even that government will have at least 95% of my obedience will be when I'm out of its military, and the Fuhrer's Mustang. At least he won't get us into some hare-brained war thought up by a preschooler."

"Amestrian?"

"Amestris is the country I come from."

"Who's Mustang?"

"My superior officer."

"You have a superior officer? And you said you were in the military?"

"Yup. Needed to join for a reason, which don't even bother asking about. If I even start explaining, we'll still be here next week."

"If no one at the school likes the Ministry official," the second centaur redirected, also realizing that the line of conversation was again going off the deep end, "why is she teaching there, and why is no one doing anything about her or her 'followers'?"

"She's teaching there because the Fudge decided he needed a mole in Hogwarts. Which he doesn't, but he's an idiot. And I've ripped apart one of her followers quite violently in words, and she can barely say a thing in class without me contradicting her. It's a lot easier than everyone's making it out to be."

All the bows were lowered by then.

"So how does she teach her class?"

"Just with a lot of interruptions that she learned can't be ignored because the rest of the class won't pay attention to her until she answers them. Well, tries to, anyway."

"Like when?" A cheerful foal asked.

"One thing I keep contradicting her on is the…"

* * *

Okay, odd chapter, basically. But that's just because I had to stick in this part with the centaurs, because otherwise Ed was just randomly talking to them, and both were on good terms. So, yeah. There you go.

Thanks for reading, and sorry again for all of you who were waiting for this!


	9. The Other Story

This is where things _really_ start happening. And then it'll dull down a bit, and then more things will start happening. However, this chapter, and the next one, will both be fast-paced.

As previously mentioned _{multiple times}_ I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. Now since you're not here to read my disclaimers, I'll shut up now _{yay!} _and start typing the story. *chases after a happily skipping Tsuki with a ballistic missile launcher and an evil look*

* * *

Ed scowled down at no one in particular. He was still sitting on a branch in the Forbidden Forest, angry. He was pretty sure he'd bash Malfoy's head into a wall the next time he saw him.

The herd of centaurs around him ignored him for the most part. After some arguing, he'd calmed them down and formed a sort of bond: fury at the Ministry. The centaurs had come to accept him, and he them. After more debating with himself, he had come to the conclusion that he was sulking in the Forbidden Forest until he'd calmed down enough to not kill Malfoy, and then he'd have to go back, and just avoid questions. The centaurs could tell something was off, and were waiting for him to tell them what. After all, he had been in the Forest for a few days now.

"The professors will be looking for you," one of the centaurs said near him. Ed glanced over.

"Yeah..." he said, and scowled again. Ed sighed, and climbed down from the tree. "You're right, they'll be looking for me. I don't really care, but I don't want them storming in here. Especially not that bitch." The centaurs snorted and pawed the ground, knowing who he was talking about. Ed began walking back to the castle, and they walked with him for a while. They updated him on some things that had happened in the herd, and he said some things he'd done to piss off Umbitch.

He was pretty sure that was the only reason they accepted him: news on the Ministry getting its ass kicked by a fifteen year old.

* * *

Ed groaned. He leaned back, and glanced around. The library was pretty much empty, and there was the barest hint of the sun fading on the horizon, so the library was lit by candles. He left before the librarian could herd him out, and started walking down the hall toward his room. He'd sneak back in later.

He'd gotten back the day before. All the professors had been yelling at him for disappearing, and more than a few detentions had been thrown out. However, all of them were reduced under the mention of _why_ he had run off. Then the questioning had begun. He'd said that he'd had no idea who those people had been, he just remembered some of it. Like that the fights hadn't been lost, or those people weren't supposed to be dead. After much convincing, and swearing, and yelling, Ed had finally been let go from the room. At one in the morning. Luckily, it was the holidays, so he hadn't had to talk to any of the students about what had happened.

Ed barely glanced up from the hallways he was walking on when he heard a voice, but Umbridge's voice was hard to miss. He immediately turned around and walked the other way. He couldn't make out what she was saying, but she was obviously talking to someone, and it seemed like she was giving a tour. Two pairs of footsteps were walking with her.

Umbridge continued walking on, talking away, but Ed noticed that the other footsteps had stopped at the end of the hallway. He stopped as well, and shot a glare at whoever was standing there.

He froze.

They…were the _last_ people he had expected to see. Even after the boggart. His eyes met theirs, and neither moved. Ed's fingers lost their grip on the bag slung over his shoulder, and it fell to the ground. His mouth started to drop in surprise, but he whipped around and strode away. What was about to happen couldn't happen in the middle of the hallway in Hogwarts. Most of the confrontations between them hadn't ended with a wall standing.

Ed felt an annoying prick that urged him on. He tried to ignore it, but it was persistent.

* * *

Mustang looked down at his desk. He was pretty sure everyone else had left by now, otherwise he wouldn't be looking at what he was looking at. If anyone found out, they'd be pissed. Pissed that he hadn't told them sooner, and pissed that he had ordered everyone else not to try and find Fullmetal, since it was dangerous, but had continued to do so himself.

He tried to convince himself that he wanted to find Ed because he was under Mustang, and Mustang was responsible for him. Or that he wanted to shout at Ed for being an idiot, and not at least telling them what he had been planning to do.

That wasn't really true, either answer. He wanted to find Ed because he'd just saved the whole country from a near-god, he deserved the chance to come home, and he had friends and family waiting for him to come back, in which he had to include himself. And he admittedly missed arguing with him, even if he doubted they'd ever really been serious about the last arguments they had. It had almost seemed like they were arguing for the sake of keeping up morale around them. Because if you're higher ranking officers have the time to argue, then things are probably going to turn out okay, right?

...Right?

But one of the arguers was gone, and no one could replace him.

Things hadn't turned out as they should have.

Once in a while, someone would send in a letter, thanking Ed for this or that, or just plain asking why he hadn't done anything recently, if he'd retired. Whatever unlucky member of the Fuhrer's office got that letter had the job of replying back. Mustang knew that when they got them, they never mentioned it to him, but he'd figured things out when someone would be complaining about paperwork, and then glance at a letter and immediately stop. When Mustang asked, they said everything was fine.

But in all, with the exception of a few defiant people, it seemed most of the country had come to one conclusion: the Fullmetal Alchemist was dead.

He doubted it. And Mustang was pretty sure so did everyone who knew Ed. There was no way he would've passed through the Gate to sacrifice himself in exchange for his brother. He'd had something planned. But what?

Mustang reexamined what he was looking at. What Ed had done was starting to piece itself together. From what he was looking at…Ed might still be alive. Just not in Amestris. Or Xing. Or Drachma. Or Ishval, or Creta, or the desert, or Aerugo, or any other country they could name.

Ed was globally misplaced. He was on a different world.

It would make sense. Ed would have passed through and tried to find a way back from the other side. He wasn't dead and therefore he wouldn't give up. Hell, if Mustang knew him right, he'd end up accidentally convincing other people to help him without knowing what he was doing.

There was one problem. Ed didn't have any alchemic research materials with him. So, deciding Ed was alive, since there was no other option he could think of that he could accept, Mustang realized that anyone who could get Ed back would have to be on this world. No, not anyone. It would have to be Mustang. He couldn't drag up bad memories and raise hopes in case he was wrong.

Mustang was on his one for this one.

* * *

Over the next two months, Mustang sucked up information. Now that he knew what he was looking for, he could find stuff easier. Research notes made mentions of world travel that would go unnoticed by anyone except someone looking specifically for it. Hohenheim had apparently left some notes behind as well. Mustang figured he'd have to tell Ed that when he got back.

_When_.

Time was still against him, though. Ed would take this delay one of two ways: He'd shrug it off…or he'd never forgive whoever came for him for taking so long. There was no real way of knowing which to assume, since Ed had changed a lot, even when Mustang had last seen him. He had to forget about what he would do when he found him, though, because upon observation, he found he was actually afraid of Ed taking it the second way.

No one had yet figured out what he was up to. As Fuhrer, it wasn't odd to see him working on something.

Even working on world teleportation, he had somehow made it to the top position. Under Grumman, he, along with the group who had worked with him, had gone up a surprising amount of ranks. Nobody had argued, since everyone knew what had happened.* The rest of the ranks Mustang had passed through by either being in the right place at the right time and doing something, like making a decision or fighting someone and taking them down. Although Mustang had to note that most of these had been on missions Grumman had suggested he go on.

A month after Mustang had become a General, Grumman had resigned and handed the post to Mustang. The other Generals were pissed as hell, but couldn't really do anything about. Their irritation only increased when Mustang made the tendency to ignore them and work more with his usual subordinates.

Speaking of subordinates, Mustang realized, coming out of his reflection of what had brought him to his position, that one of them was starting to realize he was doing something during the day that wasn't his usual paperwork. Hawkeye. Although he had expected her to figure it out, he'd hoped to have a little longer, or hopefully even get it done. Unfortunately it seemed that wasn't going to be the case. Mustang knew she was going to figure it out and decided to let her, with no real way to try and stop Hawkeye.

It was another night, and he was piling together his research. He'd gone through everything, and hoped he'd gotten everything right. After going through it, checking it, and finding that he did in fact have an idea, it was early in the morning. In fact, it was a bit inhuman to be up this early.

Not wanting to be seen carrying a bunch of papers in case someone he was passing asked, he grabbed the top page that had the transmutation design he needed and all but ran out the door.

Hurrying down the hallway, slowing whenever he saw someone approaching, he found himself walking to where the Father had been fought during the first half of the last battle. He realized that it was, in fact, the only place near that could be big enough to draw out the full design.

After quite a while of half-running, he finally came into the massive, destroyed area they had fought the Father in. Although the top had been covered, they hadn't been able to do anything about the space below other than clear it away. Luckily, too, or Mustang would've had to waste time moving it all.

It took him half an hour, there was so much, but he finally got the full transmutation out. Mustang didn't actually need it anymore, but he didn't want to make a small error and then accidentally kill himself or something. He checked it four times for mistakes before deciding he had gotten it all right. He stared at it for a few seconds, tiredly, and then walked inside it to the center. Again, he paused, glancing down at the transmutation circle that had taken up months to figure out and complete.

The transmutation circle wasn't more of a world traveling transmutation, more than a locator and sender. It found the last person to move between worlds, and sent the next person through to near to where they were currently. If no one had gone through, other than people who were on the other side, it sent them to the last spot where someone had transmuted themselves away from. It was accurate within a few hundred or so yards. At least he knew he wouldn't have to turn the world inside out to find Ed.

He was about to put the transmutation circle into action when he realized he wasn't alone in the center of the transmutation circle. He turned to see Hawkeye watching him. "I knew something was wrong, and came in early this morning. I found your research, and guessed this was where you'd head to test it out."

Mustang blinked, and started to order her to not participate before realizing she would ignore him. He sighed, and simply said, "I'm not sure this will work."

"And we weren't sure we'd live through the Father's attack. Send us through, Fuhrer." Mustang clapped, and the two vanished from Amestris.

* * *

They reappeared in a snow covered field. It was light, and Mustang guessed the time was different because the two places were at different spots in their worlds. A forest was on one side of them, and a castle on the other. A small hut was near the forest.

"From what the Truth said, the best guess would be to use the excuse we're touring the school to send our child here. If we talk to this Umbridge person, she'll point out certain good aspects of the school. Mention that we have a trouble-making child, and she'll show some of the trouble makers. Unfortunately, Ed will probably be one of her failures. There's no way he'll let her tame him," Mustang said, thinking aloud. The Truth had given them the same information he'd given Ed, since they'd beaten him. He seemed to be taking all his beatings with amusement.

Hawkeye nodded. "Then should we ask to see some of the students?"

"Probably," Mustang agreed. "If we go through the halls, we'll see him eventually. And if we have to run after him, shouting 'pipsqueak, your master's planning to kill you and Armstrong wants to run you over with a tank', he'll eventually figure out we're there."

"Fuhrer, we don't know his position in the school. We shouldn't announce that conspicuously that we know him. And you might terrify Ed if you say his master's coming," Hawkeye said.

"Mrs. Curtis would terrify anyone. She took a good chunk out of Central when I ordered no one to try and find Ed," Mustang said, remembering the weeks they had spent trying to redo what Ed's teacher had done. They'd finally had to give up, since they couldn't figure out exactly what she'd done, and had just had to manually rebuild it. "We'll figure out how to point us out to him when we find him. Of course, that is if he doesn't yell at us first."

Hawkeye frowned. "Why would he-" She stopped as she realized where Mustang's thought line was. She glanced over to him, and he started walking toward the castle. "I doubt he'll react like that."

"You never know when it comes to Fullmetal," Mustang said, not facing her.

* * *

A long trek later, and they finally entered the school. It wasn't hard to find the obnoxious frog walking around in clothes.

"Excuse me? We're looking to enroll our child here, and we wanted to make sure we were doing the right thing over any other school," Mustang said, fighting to keep his voice polite. Hawkeye could tell he was overdoing it from knowing him well enough, but also knew he was trying not to storm through the school to find Ed.

Umbridge looked flabbergasted. She also looked torn between doing her job as a professor there and telling them they were wasting their time. "Well, do you want a tour, then?"

"Yes, that would be fine," Hawkeye said.

Umbridge nodded, and showed them through the school. After a few hours had passed, and they'd received a full run down of the history of the school, what it taught, some students that went there who both Amestrians guessed had important Ministry parents, and Ministry influence on the school. She also bragged about herself. A lot.

Both 'parents' finally had to give up on listening to her, and just look for whatever kids they could. Umbridge caught them looking, and asked if something was wrong.

"Yes. Where are all the students?" Mustang asked. "No one's in the classrooms either."

Umbridge looked surprised. "Christmas break."

Oh. Changing the subject to take attention away from Mustang's fumble, Hawkeye said, trying to at least reconfirm Ed's presence in the school, "We have a trouble making student. What do you do in these cases?"

"Ah yes. Right now, I have eliminated all trouble makers from this school," Umbridge said.

"All of them?" Despite his great attempts, Mustang's tone was full of doubt.

Umbridge paused. "There is one trouble maker who doesn't seem to want to understand we just want the best for him. He'll come around eventually."

Hawkeye and Mustang exchanged a glance as Umbridge led them to her office, talking about how she had gotten one student to stop making trouble and spreading lies. Ed was obviously the last one.

She showed them her office. "The student writes sentences, using a special quill of mine. I try to let them have the message…sink in." She motioned at her desk, where Mustang and Hawkeye saw a few quills lying next to each other.

While Hawkeye continued talking to Umbridge to distract her from Mustang, Mustang examined the quills. Two had dried red liquid in them. Blood. Guessing from where the stains were, he guessed that was what the quills used. Probably the users blood as they wrote.

There were only a few of that type. Mustang also noticed that only two of them had blood on them. One had more than the other, and the one with the least had barely a speck, and the point of the quill was practically destroyed from scratching.

Mustang hid a smile, and turned back to Umbridge and Hawkeye. "So, where do they eat?"

Umbridge brought them back to the halls, and continued blabbering. Mustang quietly confirmed that Ed was there, and hadn't gone somewhere else. And was pulling an unnoticed joke on Umbridge.

Hawkeye realized after they had passed a few more classrooms that Ed might have left the school during Christmas break. She wasn't sure where he could've gone, but he might have found a way from the school during the two weeks. "Who all is still here?" she asked, trying to keep it absent sounding.

"Only a few students. And that trouble maker," Umbridge wrinkled her nose. "You don't want to meet him. Arrogant little brat."

When Umbridge turned away from them, Mustang couldn't resist grinning. Yep, Ed was there. He was definitely there.

* * *

Mustang was seriously beginning to debate whether or not Ed was hiding in some nook, watching them, and laughing at them as they tried to find him. It really couldn't be _that_ hard to find him, could it?

His renewed energy from passing through the Gate was fading fast, along with the sunlight, and his exhaustion was returning. He had been awake for almost forty hours, and they had no idea where he was in the school, that seemed to have been designed to get people lost.

Hawkeye suddenly nudged him. He glanced at her, and she pointed down a hallway. They stopped, and Umbridge continued on without realizing they weren't there. A familiar blond braid was making its way down the hall away from them.

Ed stopped, and glared over his shoulder at them. His expression froze as he recognized them. His jaw dropped, as did his bag, and then he whipped around and all but ran away.

Hawkeye started after him. She glanced out of the corner of her eye at Mustang's hurt expression, and she grabbed his arm and tugged him after her.

Ed dodged down another hall, and they ran after him. Somehow, he was keeping ahead of them. That most likely had something to do with a ghost dumping something randomly on them that made them pause and see what had dumped it.

The sun had set by the time they made it outside. Ed stopped running a few yards away from a tree that somehow managed to look vicious. He stopped, and Mustang saw him stiffen. Mustang was pretty sure he was going to attack them.

Almost against his will, he asked the one question burning in his mind that had already been all but verbally confirmed. "Ed…you hate us, don't you?"

* * *

a/n: *Okay, honestly. There were soldiers fighting the Father above ground who saw that Mustang, Hawkeye, Ed, and a few others fighting. Grumman was probably pestered about what was going on, and finally had to spill the beans. So basically, in my version at least, and this is my version, so don't contradict, everyone in Amestris knows what happened.

So maybe Mustang wouldn't have been afraid about Ed hating him. Well…sorry. I know it's an irrational fear, but there's something I want to insert, and I think it makes more sense if that's what Mustang thinks.

So sorry about any confusion. This might not be as good as some other chapters because I kind of rushed through it. Or it might be the best since I've thought a lot about exactly how to do this part. _{But personally, I think it could use more waffles.} _What the-

No pwnages were made, but Umbridge is still at 39 and Malfoy is still at 25. Thanks for reading, and please review.


	10. What is Not Known

a/n: Alright, I'm not doing any love scenes, so nobody ask me for them because I've got the type of parents where if they happen to be looking over my shoulder and read it, then people on the other side of the world are going to hear my mom screaming at me. And children all around the world will be adding a list of profanities to their dictionary. So no love scenes. (my dad won't really care but he'll tell my mom)

By the way, I switch back and forth in between perspectives for this part because that way you fully understand what's going on. I'm trying to keep it un-confusing, but I don't think that's working right now. Oh well, it will soon, because I'll stop switching perspectives and going back and forth in time.

Disclaimer: I don't own either series. _{And that, children, is why it is called f***ing __**FAN**__fiction!}_ (When saying that sentence aloud, make sure you scream 'fan' at the top of your lungs.)

* * *

Ed bolted down the hallway away from the pair. They'd probably end up swearing at each other, to judge from past experiences. And since he had no idea what they were planning-allying with the wizards or just taking Ed and going-any sort of confrontation, whether it was shouting or just staring, would probably attract attention.

He heard a slight pause, and then the footsteps followed him. The prick attacked again, and he fought it back. After slipping down a few more halls, he burst outside. The sun was already gone, and he could make out the vague outline of the willow that he had learned was actually dangerous. Ed came to a stop a safe distance away from it.

Despite himself, the prick of tears returned, and he found he couldn't fight it. Mustang and Hawkeye had come for him. He hadn't been able to go to them, so they had come for him.

He felt himself stiffen as he tried to force the tears back. Damn it.

And then he heard the last thing he expected to hear: "Ed…you're mad at us, aren't you?"

…Say what?

Hawkeye heard the hurt in Mustang's voice. She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, but looked back as she saw Ed's head snap up. He whipped around, and Hawkeye felt a shock run through her. Ed was…crying?

"What the hell did you just say?" Ed all but screamed at Mustang. "Why would I be mad at you?"

Mustang blinked. "Well…we took months to get here-"

"So?" Ed barely let Mustang finish his sentence. "You still _got_ here! That's better than I could do! I'm still figuring out the basics of teleporting!"

"So?" Now Mustang was also near-screaming. Hawkeye decided to hang back until she had to dump water on them. Until then it would probably be dangerous. The only thing that made this shouting match different from any other was that Ed was crying. "We still took way too damn long! Everyone thinks you're dead!"

"Well, I'm not! But they never would have known that if you hadn't found me, now would they?"

"It doesn't matter! You can't make up lost time!"

"A few months is better than an eternity!" Ed suddenly whipped around to face Hawkeye. "Is he sick or something?"

Mustang got a tick mark. "No, I am not f***ing sick!"

"Coulda fooled me!" Ed redirected his attention. "Why the hell are you blaming yourself for something you couldn't do, damn it? You figured it out before me, and I'm the one who usually does the alchemic research! Why are you beating yourself up about it?"

"Because you never let anyone else help!" Mustang shouted at him. Ed froze. "If you let someone else help you for once, you wouldn't end up paying prices so big! If I'd gone with you to the Truth, you wouldn't be here right now!"

"You're right! Because I would've been to busying throwing you back out of the Gate that I would've screwed up and gotten myself killed!"

"I would've liked to see you try!"

"How did you get here?" Ed demanded, honestly puzzled. Neither looked to be missing anything important.

"Transmutation. Obviously," Mustang snapped. Ed glared. "The Truth played a practical joke on you. There is no price to go between universes. It's like destroying a building, and using the exact same materials to create the exact same building somewhere else by moving the materials. No price."

Ed rubbed his head, getting rid of the last of his tears. "Damn it." He looked up at Mustang. "The Truth told me I'd probably get back. The price I was paying was my time away from all of you. My stay here was never meant to be permanent."

Hawkeye frowned. "Wait. If you knew we'd come, or you'd get home, then why..." She didn't want to audibly say Ed had been crying, or they'd spend the next hour of dealing with Ed loudly denying it.

Ed gritted his teeth. "Just...something jumbled my nerves recently. It...I don't know. It shouldn't have affected me that much." He looked between the two. "How do we get back?"

Mustang flinched. "Ed...we can't. Yet," he added quickly, seeing Ed's stunned expression. "I...well..." Mustang sighed angrily. "You'll be able to, but not yet. The dimensional barriers are having trouble right now because we passed through. We were pushing it with two people. The barriers have accepted us passing through, and are going to take a month or so to process that. They can't take a third person right now."

Ed didn't respond. His teeth were tightly clenched, and he wasn't looking at either person in front of him.

"I'm sorry," Mustang said, more softly.

Ed shook his head. "No...I understand." He looked up. "A...month or so?"

"Ed," Mustang said firmly. "I'm not leaving. Not until you're going too." Ed blinked. Mustang felt a slight flash of irritation. "Jeez, what did you think I was going to do? Get chased by your teacher and someone with a tank? Hell no. I'm sending Hawkeye back, because they won't kill her, but they will me, and hope their irritation wears off before I see them." Hawkeye turned to him, not having heard this.

"I'm going back without you two?" There was a tone in her voice that Mustang knew meant she was trying not to bash him over the head.

"If someone doesn't go back, they'll think we're dead too," Mustang said, sighing. "That's the last thing they need. And Armstrong is _not_ taking my spot."

Ed cocked his head slightly. "Your spot?" Then it dawned on him. "You're Fuhrer now, aren't you?" Mustang smirked in response. Ed rolled his eyes. "Well, _damn_, you sure took long enough!"

"Yeah, and you're in a position to say that," Mustang retorted. "You're not even a General."

"Psh. I got a promotion for killing the Father, right?" Mustang didn't answer. "I _didn't_? What the hell do people need to do to get promotions around here? Save the world from imminent threats every day? Oh wait! Already did that!"

"You're a Major General," Hawkeye said calmly.

Ed whipped around to face Mustang. "Hah!"

A tick mark appeared on Mustang's head. "Oh whatever. I meant a full general."

"I'm still a general of sorts!"

They continued their bickers, and Hawkeye figured Ed's and Mustang's mental wounds from the time had already healed if the two were already arguing without being actually angry. Hawkeye sighed as Mustang and Ed approached the about-to-start-burning-and-destroying-all-ground-in-a-five-mile-radius mode, and fetched a bucket of water. She was going to need it.

Because boys will be boys.

* * *

Mustang watched as students began flooding the halls. He was watching with Ed from the top of a wall the students didn't look up at, especially when they were catching up with their friends. The break had ended, and the kids were back. Ed was pointing out people he needed to know, that the Truth _hadn't_ supplied the names of.

"Okay, see that platinum?"

"Yeah. The kid you've so colorfully named Malfoy?"

"Yeah, that's the bastard." Ed scowled. "Going to kick his ass soon. And those two twins are the Weasley twins. Things tend to get...dangerous around them. Don't eat anything they make. I'm still not sure the made cures for their stuff. Actually, I'm positive that they haven't."

"Yeah, you mentioned those two," Mustang said. "Those are Harry, Hermione, and Ron?" He pointed at three people passing below them.

"Unless there are three other people who go this school that look exactly like them," Ed responded. "Over there's McGonagall...and that's Umbridge. She can't put up with a political challenge worth shit. That's Dumbledore, and Snape just went around that corner over there. That was Binns who just went through you."

"I noticed," Mustang said with a tick mark.

Ed smirked. He sighed. "Oh shit. This is not going to be good."

Mustang raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"I went a bit...MIA right before break. I'm going to be answering questions all day," Ed groaned. "Oh this sucks."

The two sat there in silence, watching the students mill below them, for a few minutes before Ed had to go to the Great Hall for dinner. Mustang had smirked at that, and said he'd probably steal some food from the kitchen.

"Make sure to throw a dung bomb in Umbridge's room," was Ed's response.

* * *

"Where were you?" Hermione demanded the second she saw Ed.

"Honestly? Forbidden Forest," Ed said, sitting down. The other three sat as well, gaping. "The centaurs really don't like the Ministry, by the way."

"You were in the Forbidden Forest, talking to centaurs," Ron said doubtfully. Ed shrugged. "Where were you, really? And...Ed, don't take this offensively, but...for someone who just went missing for a few days due to their worst fear being revealed to everyone, you've got quite the happy glow."

Ed blinked. "Huh?"

"He's right," Hermione said, frowning. "You're smiling. Like you know something we don't."

Ed shrugged, realizing that they were right. He fought to try and get the slight smile off his face. "Maybe I do know something you don't. Maybe that's why I'm smiling."

Harry waved a hand in front of his face. Ed jerked backward, raising an eyebrow at him. "Are you okay?" Harry asked, peering at him. "You're...like, super-happy."

"Am not-"

"Ed," Hermione said suddenly. She seemed worried now. "I don't know if you've noticed this, but...this whole time, at school...even when you've attacked Umbridge and gloated about it afterward, you've never actually been..._happy_. You are now. What happened?"

Ed ignored her, and ate. The three watched him carefully, and glanced up at Dumbledore occasionally. When he gave his speech, he mentioned nothing of Ed. No explanations. Because, they realized...for once, Dumbledore honestly didn't know a thing.

* * *

Weeks passed, and the trio was just as confused as before. They'd even asked McGonagall, and she had confirmed that neither she nor Dumbledore had an idea of what had changed him. He still was arrogant and snappy as ever, but he argued with more enthusiasm, and a smirk that said, as Hermione had mentioned, that he knew something no one else did. When asked, he denied that anything had changed.

"And you don't know what could've cause it?" Sirius asked one night, frowning.

Harry shook his head. "Nothing's changed. He's just...a different person. Like, he still argues with Umbridge every minute he can, but he...he's changed. His attacks are different, and he's..."

"Wow, you're so specific," Sirius said sarcastically. "I don't really understand what you're all trying to say. From what I'm gathering, he's happier?"

"Yeah," Ron said. "But...he's...he's _Ed. _Ed's not that happy."

Sirius cocked his head. "Did any of you ask if he regained his memories?" The three stopped and exchanged glances. "You didn't?" He sighed mockingly and shook his head. "That's probably what happened. He remembered something."

The next day was a Hogsmeade weekend, which prevented them from asking him. On Monday, they never got a chance to ask him then either, before their table was flooded with owls carrying responses to Harry about an interview he'd given. Ed had helped the others with figuring out which messages were saying he was a nut job and which were encouraging him.

Umbridge stormed by at some point. "What's going on here? Why have you got all these letters, Mr. Potter?"

"Because it's none of your business," Ed said smoothly. "Why are you here?"

"Because it is my job to know the goings-on of the students," Umbridge said, and opened her mouth to ask again.

"Yeah, but standing over their shoulders and poking your nose where it doesn't belong. How about the teachers? Are you looking at what they're doing?" Ed persisted. Umbridge glared down at him, and Ed glanced at the High Table. "Oh look, their table's on fire. Nice."

To the surprise of the other students, it _was_ on fire. The teachers were frantically trying to put it out, but the fire seemed to be burning oddly in a way that they were unable to put it out. Ed snickered as Umbridge rushed off to help. He knew the reason, judging from the figure he saw disappear around a corner by the High Table. Mustang had created the fire to burn in a way that wouldn't work with the spells, because of what it burned off of.

He had to admit, it was a pretty funny sight to see all the teachers flailing with books and parts of the table cloth to get the fire out. More than one student agreed with him. Half the Hall was laughing their heads off.

* * *

Mustang patrolled the halls from in the passages that dotted the school, unknown to the regular students. There were secret halls everywhere, if you looked close enough. He'd heard from Ed that the teachers used them often, and had learned their schedules to dodge them. Knowing that he couldn't see through walls, duh, he had put tiny slits in the walls that let sound filter through. His short time of being blind let him know where things were with just sound.

The kids were all in possession of the _Quibbler. _This was now against school rules, and Umbridge had begun checking the students for it. As an evil idea popped into mind, he began following Umbridge on her rounds.

After a few minutes, she cornered a group of students and had them empty their pockets. One of the students had forgotten to change the pages and cover of their copy, and nervously began to hide it. Umbridge took notice, and was about to reach for it.

Mustang clapped, and pressed both hands against the wall. A circuit ran up to a lamp, and extinguished it. Umbridge looked up in surprise, and Mustang reached through a hole he created to snatch the _Quibbler._ By the time Umbridge looked back down, the hole was gone, and so was the _Quibbler._ Frustrated at the contents of what the students had, she stalked off.

The students exchanged nervous glances, and looked at the one who hadn't changed their copy. "It's not here!" he said, raising his arms in surprise. One of them suddenly pointed to the floor. Looking down, they saw the _Quibbler_ the boy had been carrying. Picking it up, he noticed a small note written on one of the corners. "Don't get caught," he read aloud slowly. He exchanged looks with the others, and hurriedly changed the cover and pages. The group hurried off, and so did a smirking Mustang.

* * *

Ed was walking down the hall when he heard it. The twins testing something. Sighing, he walked over to where they were testing some sort of dung bomb. He glanced back from where he'd just come, and ran up to the twins. "Hey, put it up!" He again looked back over his shoulder, remembering who he'd seen following him. "Umbridge's coming!"

Fred and George glanced at each other. "Um...we can't stop it. That's what we're testing it for."

Ed palmed his face. "You two are idiots."

"I don't suppose you can rat us out of this one, can you?"

"Not unless you throw it at her and run off. But then, we're too far away from either end of the hall."

"Darn."

"Can you hide it? She'll turn the corner any second now."

"And the bomb will go _off_ any second now."

"...Shit."

* * *

Umbridge gave a small smile, realizing she had cornered Ed. She was positive he was in possession of a _Quibbler_, and the hall he'd just turned down had two halls branching off of it that both led to dead ends. She turned the corner, and stopped. No Ed. She glanced down both hallways in case he'd turned down one of them, but he wasn't there.

Frowning, she retraced her steps.

Umbridge didn't notice the tell-tale scratch-like marks along the floor.

* * *

Fred and George looked wildly around. They'd been sitting on the floor, waiting for Umbridge with Ed, when the floor had opened up and they'd fallen throw. Ed seemed unperturbed, like this happened every day. The ceiling had closed up above them, and other than a single flame flickering on a bracketed torch, it was pitch dark.

Ed stood, and brushed himself off. "So that's why no one's gotten caught with the _Quibbler,_" he said absently.

George scrambled to his feet beside Fred. "They fall throw holes in the floor?"

"Nah," Ed said, looking around the room for something. "Hey, Mustang."

"Here," someone said, walking from a dark corner. "Next time, get an escape route, you two."

"Um...Ed?" Fred asked. "Do you know him?"

"Yeah," both said simultaneously. They glanced at each other, and the person who'd dropped the floor said, "I'm Mustang. I knew Ed a while back, and I'm staying at the school until further notice."

The twins exchanged glances. "You...know each-wait, did Ed get his memories back?"

"Never lost 'em," Ed said simply. "We're trying to keep this under wraps for now. Don't tell until we tell you to, okay?"

"Why?" George said cautiously. Harry hadn't said that any of the Death Eaters looked like them, but there was aways a Polyjuice Potion to consider. Besides, why would they want to cover up Ed's memories?

"Well...we're waiting for something to happen," Mustang said. "It's kind of hard to explain, unless you know what happened last year, and that'd take about a few months to explain. We're not with the Death Eaters, if that's what you're wondering. True, we've pulled off illegal stunts, but not that kind of illegal."

"Then who are you? Why did you tell everyone you don't have any memories?" Fred asked.

Ed sighed. "We'll give the full explanation later, but...we're waiting for the dimensions to allow people to pass through. It's still recovering from Mustang and Hawkeye passing through. We're waiting for me to be able to go back to my dimension."

The two exchanged glances. "Um...what? You've lost us."

"Ed's from a different dimension. It wasn't like he could just tell you that and expect people to believe him," Mustang explained. "Hence the lost memory. Keep it quiet, though. I'm having fun ticking off Umbridge."

"So...you're waiting with Ed for the dimensions to let you pass through," Fred said gesturing to Mustang. When he nodded, George continued the thought line and motioned to Ed while saying, "And you came here a while ago, and are trying to get back." Another nod. The twins paused and exchanged glances. "Wicked."

Mustang raised an eyebrow and turned to Ed. "Are they always like this?"

"Normally they're blowing up hallways, and sometimes they're asleep," Ed said. "Don't worry: we still top the destruction rampage at roughly 98 acres."

"Awesome! What'd you do?" The twins exclaimed.

"Remember the burning table?" Mustang smirked. "I'm the Flame Alchemist, and Ed's the Fullmetal Alchemist. Every once in a while, we start a quarrel that turns into a fight and in the process destroy some poor farmer's farm."

"Hey, I repaired that!" Ed snapped. "And you started it!"

"No, you did. I was quite willing to keep it verbal."

"You started the verbal fight!"

"And you destroyed the farm."

"I repaired it! And I brought up some of the minerals that had sunk too low to help the farm! He thanked me for it!"

"You still destroyed it."

"Tch."

The twins watched the exchange in amusement. Then George realized something at the same time as Fred. "You were the one Lee was talking about! Who stole his _Quibbler_ when Umbridge passed by and then dropped it when she left!"

"Yup," Mustang said.

"Having fun wrecking havoc on the school rules?" Ed smirked.

"Absolutely. By the way, the upstairs bathrooms should be overflowing by now. I burst some of the pipes."

"I saw that!" Fred laughed. "I thought Lee might have jinxed it without telling us... That makes more sense."

"Hey, don't you all have class?" Mustang asked.

"They won't mind if we skip...actually, they probably will," George admitted. "Fine. We won't tell, as long as you tell us when you destroy something."

"Oh, you'll know. I don't tend to do small things," Mustang said. "If you or Ed didn't do it, I probably did. See you around."

* * *

a/n: So realizations are made and secrets revealed. The guys had their usual argument and mischief, and once again the females seem to be the only ones with cool heads. Anyone noticing a trend? (excluding General Armstrong and Izumi) _{This is obviously because women just tend to be the smarter ones...not to be mean to those few guys who are honestly clear-headed.}_

By the way, I don't think they say in the book how Umbridge learned that Sirius was meeting them in the fire, but I think it was because they were talking about him in the courtyard. So when Ed cut off Ron, I prevented that part from happening. That's why Sirius is still appearing in the fireplace. I made up the farm exchange, too. I just wanted them to destroy 98 acres of something for no reason.

Are there secret hallways that the teachers use? Well...I really don't know. I think they mentioned something like that at some time. If there aren't...well damn it, there are now!

Pwnage tally:

Malfoy: 25

Umbridge: 3/Total: 42

Thanks for reading! Review if you want to!


	11. The Arrival

a/n: this is where things begin to get amusing. Problem is, I've double crossed half the stuff Umbridge did, so some things no longer work. Going to have to find a way around that. Oh well. I'm bringing in a whole other country. Why am I complaining?

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. If I do…woah. That's new.

* * *

Because of Harry's new fame, no one noticed Mustang. Occasionally, when they passed, Fred and George would tell Ed that Mustang had done this or that, and Umbridge was really pissed about it. When this happened, they tended to get a miraculously appearing note that said 'duh' or something. Also because of Harry's fame, no one noticed the exchanges.

* * *

Ed and Mustang had a few hours until the sun rose. Ed opened the window carefully, and looked down. It wouldn't be that hard to scale down what they could of the wall, and use alchemy for what they couldn't. They slipped out the window, and made their way down the wall.

A few minutes later, and they touched the ground. Mustang glanced around to make sure no one saw them, and caught up to Ed, who had already started jogging. Ed checked for the right landmarks to make sure they were going in the right direction.

* * *

Ed carefully surveyed what they were looking at.

This was where two of the Triwizard events of the previous year had taken place. And where, according to Harry, the 'dead' had walked.

They examined the ground in front of them. Most of the evidence was gone, but some remained. No matter what was done to it, human transmutation couldn't be covered up. Especially not by people who didn't think of the chemical changes that had taken place. Ed of all people could tell from what remained that someone had tried to bring someone else back to life. The question remained if they had survived.

He frowned thoughtfully. The only reasonable answer was there. Harry wouldn't have killed someone for no apparent reason. Or dragged a body out that had been killed in the maze by some monster to claim Voldemort was back. Harry hated the attention he was getting anyway. He didn't need more.

All the right minerals and such were in front of them. Every ingredient-except the soul-needed to make a body were there. If the soul had been wandering around, it wouldn't have killed someone to bring the person back in a different body. Although it was pretty impressive if they'd gotten the correct body form back.

So, the Ministry was wrong.

Voldemort was back.

And probably very pissed off, too.

* * *

Two months had passed since Mustang had first come to Hogwarts. He said that the dimensions would be ready any time.

And they were.

It was during breakfast in the Great Hall when it happened. Nobody had expected it, and even Ed was surprised, as well as Mustang who was watching from a corner no one was checking.

"So we'll try for another D.A. tomorrow..." Hermione was saying. Harry and Ron nodded, and Ed focused on the ceiling, which was what he had been doing for the past few minutes. He was listening, just didn't appear to be.

The right door of the Great Hall slammed open. Students craned their necks to see who was there. Umbridge frowned, and stood. Ed glanced over, and felt a shock run through him. "W...Winry," he whispered.

"You idiot!" The teenage blond mechanic sprinted across the hall and all but tackled Ed, who barely was able to keep his balance. He'd stood up from his seat at the table, and now was in full view of all the students. He felt a flush come over his face, and was a bit surprised when no wrench made contact with his head. He glanced at Winry, and was shocked to find her crying. "...Idiot..." she whispered.

The moment was ruined the second Fred gave an encouraging whistle. George snickered and joined in. Ed shot them the bird, which just encouraged them. George clapped cheerfully, and gave Ed a thumbs-up.

"What is going on?" Umbridge demanded.

"Nothing that hasn't been happening for a long time. You were just to dense to notice," Mustang announced calmly. He walked out from his corner, and strode between the tables to Winry and Ed. "Alright, you two, let's go. Hope no one minds digging our graves, since Mrs. Curtis is going to kill us..."

"Oh shit," Ed said, a horrified expression. Winry managed a small smile at the two's reactions. "We are so dead."

"That's putting it mildly. And for a grand exit..." Mustang said, clapping. He pressed his palms to the floor, and wind and lightning flew around them. "Here we go..."

"Take _this_, you damn Truth." Ed smirked.

The students watched in shock as the three vanished from the Hall. Scorch marks lined the table and floor, and part of the table was burning. Not a shred was left of them.

"_What was that_?" Umbridge shrieked.

"It appears...Ed wasn't entirely who he said he was," Dumbledore said calmly.

"You knew?" Umbridge turned her shrieking to Dumbledore.

"No. I didn't know." Dumbledore peered down at the scorches. "Although, he did. I wonder if he knew the whole time." He looked around at the students. "Dismissed." The students slowly got to their feet and left, whispering.

"Hey, did three people just leave?" Someone suddenly yelled. The voices stopped, and all turned to the newest person. It was a ticked-off woman. She glanced at the scorch marks. "Damn them. Could've waited..." She clapped, and everyone near her backed up. She slammed her hands onto the ground, and disappeared.

* * *

"What was that?" Ron hissed, walking with the other two out of the Great Hall.

"I don't know..." Hermione responded. "Ed knew them. But...how?"

"He never lost his memory," a voice behind them said cheerfully. They turned to see Fred and George standing there, grinning. George continued, "Apparently, he and those other two people came from a different dimension, and the only explanation they could give was that Ed had lost his memory."

"How do you know?" Hermione demanded.

"They told us when Mustang helped us escape from Umbridge a month or so back," George said.

"We were setting off a sort of dung bomb when Ed came toward us, but apparently Umbridge was following him, and Mustang dropped us through the floor. They explained some things," Fred said.

"Mustang jammed the toilets upstairs, by the way, not us."

"And he lit the High Table on fire."

"Not to mention blew up Umbridge's room."

"He also blocked off all the hallways that one time when everyone was sleeping."

The three exchanged glances. "And you've sat on this this whole time?" Harry snapped.

"Well, they told us to," George said. "They're not Death Eaters, or they would've killed you long ago, Harry. Or Dumbledore. Ed would've had plenty of chances."

"...You should got to Dumbledore immediately," Hermione finally said.

The twins shrugged, and moved off.

The next day, with no return or message from Ed, Mustang, the woman, or Winry, and Umbridge caught the D.A. Other than Harry and Marietta, none of the students were caught. Because the paper with all their names on it was a bit MIA.

* * *

They reappeared in Central, almost exactly where they had first left. An small but anxious crowd was waiting for them. "About time!" Havoc shouted to them when they appeared. Ed stuck out his tongue, and Havoc laughed cheerfully. "Nice to see you again, Chief!"

"Yeah...no kidding," Ed said, rubbing his head. He felt someone slam into him, and he stumbled before regaining his balance. "Why is everyone running into me? Jeez...Al!" He turned excitedly to the almost-mirror image.

"Nii-san!"*

Electricity flew behind the four. They turned, and Izumi appeared. "You!" She shouted, pointing at Ed. "You better have a grave prepared! 'Cause I'm burying you in it!" While Ed began a futile run, she turned to Mustang. "And you! You're going with him!"

"Yeah... Um, no thank you," Mustang said, and tried to slip off.

Izumi somehow managed to throw Mustang at Ed. The observers laughed, but carefully kept out of the line of fire. "Don't hit me!" Fuery shouted, dodging the flying pair.

* * *

Minutes (sorry, that's _hours_) later, and they'd managed to make it through the streets and to Mustang's office. Half the time had been running from the scary alchemy teacher, and the other half had occurred when they'd been chased to the streets, and someone had caught sight of Ed. That time had been spent being chased by people.

Everyone who wasn't running was laughing their heads off.

Finally, they were able to collapse inside the Fuhrer's office. Ed was sprawled face down on the floor, and Al was sitting beside him, happy and amused. Winry was on the other side, fixing his automail, with several groans from Ed provoking a wrench-slamming. Mustang was sitting in his chair, trying not to get his head shot off by Hawkeye. Brosh, Ross, Falman, Breda, Havoc, Fuery, and everyone else who worked under Mustang or Ed was grinning. Izumi was pissed at Ed, Ling was happily antagonizing the blond by his head by poking him, Sig, Scar, and Lan Fan were quietly watching, now-Colonel Armstrong was in hysterics, General Armstrong was scowling at the top of Ed's overly poked head, and May was talking to Al and the groaning Ed.

"So what were you doing?" Winry asked, poking Ed's arm with her wrench.

"Ow...I was pissing off a Ministry official..." Ed groaned. "Mustang, you explain."

"Yes, since you're having an introduction with our wonderful floor..." Mustang said, raising an eyebrow. "Ed ended up enrolled in a school, which I assume Hawkeye has already told you about. Skipping forward, or technically backward, some dead guy who's apparently not all that dead..."

Mustang got out the full story, and explained what they'd been doing since Hawkeye had left. And the information they'd stolen and then given back to Dumbledore's office, which contained where the Order of the Phoenix thought the Horcruxes were.

"So if we destroy the Horcruxes, Voldemort will die?" Izumi said. "After we kill him too."

"Yeah," Ed said, voice muffled by the floor.

Falman smiled. "This is sounding more and more like our area of expertise."

* * *

"So this is Hogwarts..." May said, cocking her head at the school. "There are two Horcruxes here."

From Mustang's research, they had learned that the dimensions accepted people at a pace. It took time to accept one person, and a little less time to accept two people, the next limit. Since it doubled, it next let four people through. After that, it had become more flexible, and let anyone pass freely through. It hadn't been chance they'd gotten everyone safely through: Mustang had known when he let Hawkeye join him, and Izumi had checked his research before going through with Winry, who had expressed wishes to bash Ed's head inside out.

To let the group they had picked out through, they had ended up waiting for a few months. During which, Amestris was allowed to know that no, Ed was _not_ as dead as they had thought he was. In fact, he wasn't dead in the slightest at all. The months had been spent with much grumbling from mailbox overload on Central's part.

"That's something I was thinking about," Mustang said. "I think part of Voldemort's soul was stuck in Harry Potter when he tried to kill him. He's the Horcrux in there."

"Who votes on ignoring the school until we destroy all the other Horcruxes?" Ling announced, loud enough for them all to hear. All the hands raised. "Great."

"How the hell are we going to get around?" Ed said, frowning. Mustang raised an eyebrow at him, and gestured to the Forbidden Forest. "Oh." Ed nodded, and started walking forward. He glanced at them as they started to follow. "Unless you all want to get pummeled to death by a herd of centaurs, you should stay back. They don't take kindly to intruders."

"And you?" Izumi said skeptically.

"Oh, I pissed off Umbridge on more than one occasion," Ed said, shrugging. "They accepted me after the fourth story of me bitching at Umbridge." Izumi frowned, but let him go.

The alchemist disappeared into the forest. After a few minutes of waiting, and Al walked unchallenged into the forest after him. The rest were close to going after him as well. They weren't exactly all that trusting when Ed said he'd be back anymore.

* * *

Al frowned. He'd been walking for a while, and no Ed. Although, it was a pretty big forest...

He heard the sound of hooves behind him. He turned, and centaurs whipped past him. He took a step back, and barely avoided being trampled by another stream of them. He stopped until they slowed, and circled back around. The group was split between wary, angry, and curious.

"...You look like someone we've seen in this forest before," one finally said.

"Ed? He's my brother," Al said, nervously looking around the centaurs. "He went in here to look for something... He and Mustang didn't say what. He didn't come out for a few minutes, so I went in after him."

The first centaur glanced at the one beside him, who nodded, turned, and galloped off. Half of the herd split with him, going deeper into the forest. "They'll look for him. We don't appreciate trespassers."

"Yeah, that's what Ed said." Al sighed.

"So why did you come in?"

Al suppressed a wince. "The last time...he said he'd come back...we didn't see him for almost eight months. I guess...I was just overreacting."

The centaurs shifted. "Why didn't you see him for eight months?" Another asked. "You wizards have your methods of getting around." Snorts of agreements and angry words agreed with him.

"We're not wizards," Al said confidently. This was one thing he was definitely not going along with. "We're alchemists. The alchemy you have here is different from what we have. Equivalent exchange is a law we have to follow while using our alchemy. While saving my life with alchemy, my brother paid his price and ended up here. He was here during those eight months, and we just recently figured out how to get to him."

The centaurs exchanged glances, murmuring. "Why are you here, then?" Another asked. "You've got him back."

"The war with the wizards," Al explained. "Ed, me, and our friends kind of do stuff like this a lot. Pull off odd operations..."

"Your friends?" Yet another centaur asked.

"Yeah, they're waiting for us outside the forest."

"And how do we know they won't follow you two?"

"If they come, you'll hear them. They're...loud, and Master will have some colorful language choice," Al said, a sweat drop of exasperation appearing on his head. "Trust me, you'll hear them."

The other half of the centaur herd cantered back. Following a distance behind them was Ed. "Al!" He sighed. "Impatient, much?" Al rubbed the back of his head. "Sorry, I haven't been able to find them yet. Although Hagrid used a bigger piece of meat to attract them..."

"What?" Al asked, frowning.

"You're looking for the threstrals, aren't you?" the first centaur said. Ed nodded. "We saw a group of them a few minutes ago." He pointed in the direction the centaurs had come from. "Go that way, and you'll find them." The centaur herd galloped away, leaving the two brothers standing there.

"Told you," Ed said, turning in the direction they had been pointed. "They're not exactly a welcoming party. The centaurs are really proud of their lineage. If you'd said anything even mildly insulting, you'd be in the ground by now."

"Yeah, I noticed," Al said, following his brother. "What are threstrals?"

Ed didn't speak for a few seconds. "They're animals that pull the carriages for the students to get to Hogwarts. Most people can't seem them. But none of us will have that problem." Ed glanced at Al's confused expression. "Threstrals can only be seen by those who have seen death."

Al paused, then hurried to catch up to Ed. "How did they adapt to that?"

Ed shrugged. "No idea. It's pretty cool...here they are." He motioned to the horse-like creatures whose forms were beginning to show in the trees. Ed pulled something out of his pocket, and held it out. Al recognized it as a piece of meat. "I stole it from the kitchens at Central before we left... I was planning to eat it, but oh well."

The nearest threstral made a move for the piece of meat. Ed moved it out of reach, and started walking to where they had come from. "Come on. At least there's a lot of you..." Ed glanced to what they had been gathered around, and saw the carcass of whatever they had been eating. They'd stripped it down to the bone.

They appeared from the forest, Ed carrying a piece of meat over his head, and the group of threstrals following him and Al. The Amestrians/Xingese/Ishvalan approached them as well.

"Um...these are who you were thinking of?" Fuery asked, a threstral nudging his back, when they had merged with the threstrals.

"Yeah. Unless you want to figure out how well you can fly on some high-jacked brooms..." Mustang said, swinging onto the nearest one. Fuery hesitated, then scrambled on to the one that had been nudging them.

Ed tossed the meat to the one that had been first trying to get it. While it ate the meat, he swung himself up on the back of it. Al mounted one by it, and the others managed to get on one as well.

"How do we know they'll go where we want them to go?" General Armstrong asked.

"Because if we don't, we're going to be stuck on brooms." Mustang replied. "Which will end embarrassingly. For all of us." He glanced down at his threstral. "The nearest Horcrux should be..." Mustang rattled off a place. There was a slight pause, before his threstral spread its wings, and shot into the sky. The other threstrals followed.

* * *

"Okay, is it just me, or did that not go entirely as planned?" Mustang commented, hair singed in several places.

"No, really," Ed said, sarcasm dripping. "What gave you that idea?"

They had destroyed the first Horcrux, after much swearing and yelling at the ring. Mustang had tried to blow it up with flames, but the flames had rebounded. Now, all of them looked like they'd just escaped from a volcano, except for the few who had wisely stayed back. Havoc was snickering, and Mustang kept shooting him glares for it.

May spoke up. "As I was trying to tell you with the first one, before..." She glanced at Ed's hair, which was worse than Mustang's. All his hair was standing on end, and his braid was barely keeping it together.

"Don't. Even. Go there," Ed warned.

May shot him a glare. "I wasn't going to. Anyway, I think I can destroy the Horcruxes using alkahastery."

Mustang sighed. "It's better than retrying what we did."

"No kidding," Hawkeye said quietly. Ed snickered.

"Here, let's split up. Get two done at once. We'll meet at the next one, or the one after that," Ling said, and a few went with him. The two groups split.

The next stop May had to guide them to. Like the Stones, she, Ling, and Lan Fan could sense where they were. It was a building Mustang figured out from the papers they had looked at was the Order of the Phoenix. After a few minutes, they managed to break in, and destroy the locket.

Mustang slipped up the one he had ridden, and led the now reduced group from the house. An hour or so of flying later, and they landed in the middle of the night on a building called _Gringotts_. They slipped off the threstrals, and were about to vote on who was staying behind when they realized there was something flying above them.

Ed, from habit, slipped off his glove, and prepared to change his arm into a knife. "Wait," Izumi said, holding an arm in front of him. "They're threstrals. That must be the rest of us."

It was. They landed, and sullenly walked up to them. "Sorry. We didn't get any," Ling sighed. He motioned to something Lan Fan was carrying. "Found a sword, but it's not a Horcrux."

Ed frowned. "Ling? Did you go swimming?" He noticed his friend was dripping wet.

Ling sighed again, and General Armstrong answered. "We were fishing for it, when he tripped and fell in the pond." Ed raised an amused eyebrow, and Ling shot a glare at him. "Who's staying behind?"

"You chose who's staying behind for your group. Lan Fan, Ed, Havoc, Al, Fuery, and Ross," Ling said, "and me. We'll all go ahead and head to the next one. Save time. Hopefully it'll actually be a Horcrux this time."

* * *

a/n: *This means 'brother', for you sad people who didn't know that. I made a mistake, the error of which I've figured out, so if there are any more spellings of 'oniisan' instead of 'niisan', let me know. (If you're wondering, the difference is that oniisan is more proper, and niisan less so.)

The group that went through is Ed (duh), Al (also duh), Mustang (I'm just going to quit with the 'duh's), Hawkeye, General Armstrong, Fuery, Havoc, Ling, May, Scar, Lan Fan, Ross, Izumi, and Winry (because she threatened to bash Ed's head inside out if they didn't let her go). I mean, seriously, I can't send _everyone_. (actually, I tried it, and it...well, didn't end well). Why am I sending Havoc? You'll see.

Quick note of Tsuki: Because we have something like that twin 'telepathy', we end up having conversations on here. So thank you, Tsuki, for being comic relief. (you just got pwned)

Pwnage tally:

Malfoy: 0/Total: 25

Umbridge: 3/Total: 45

Tsuki: ... a big number. Although mine is probably just as big a tally.


	12. The Easy Way Out of it

a/n: for here on, I haven't planned ahead. So I hope this works out. (well, I've vaguely planned ahead, but not really) But this will work out, damn it. So there.

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. Because we have something we like to call FANFICTION which you happen to be reading.

* * *

"So, the rest are at the school?" Al asked, cocking his head at the castle. "Other than the snake. Which we're holding off on until we approach Voldemort."

"Yeah, pretty much," Ed said. "Should we wait for the others?"

"Sure, what the hell." Havoc shrugged. "This is actually a lot more comfortably than my wheelchair... Do you think the threstral will mind if I take up a permanent residence up here?"

Ed shrugged. "I don't know. Want to ask it?"

Havoc looked down at the threstral, who turned its head to look back at him. With a straight face, Havoc said, "Can I take you home in place of my wheelchair?" He stared at it for a few seconds before sighing. "Damn. With all this magic and crap, I actually thought that might work."

Ed rolled his eyes.

* * *

Mustang gripped the threstral's mane as it dived. It pulled to a halt, beat its wings, then settled on the ground. "You waited?" he asked the group watching them as he slipped off.

"Yeah. Figured if we were going to storm the place, we were waiting for you," Ling said. "So...I assume you got it?" He raised an eyebrow at their harried condition. Somehow, they managed to look even worse.

"Yeah. After getting past a dragon, and figuring out a way to get all those damn pieces of crap to stop multiplying every time we touched them," Izumi said irritably. "Tell me you got one."

Ling motioned to the castle. "Other than the snake, they're all here. Remember?" Ling hid behind Ed when Izumi shot a glare at him. "We, uh, kind of forgot about that."

Mustang sighed. "Okay, who wants to storm the place? Or just send Ed in, politely asking to be given the Horcruxes?"

"When you can get Ed to ask politely, the second one," Hawkeye said.

"Which'll happen when the world ends," Al agreed. "Do we really have to storm the place?"

"What's that?" General Armstrong said suddenly, pointing to where there were shouts going on. Flashes of light were coming from there too.

"Reasonable be damned, yeh won' take me like this, Dawlish!" They heard Hagrid yell.

No one in the group spoke. Then: "...It appears Umbridge is sacking Hagrid. Or...trying to, anyway," Mustang said calmly.

"Really?" Ed said dryly. He shook his head, sighing. "Let's go give him a hand..." He moved off, closely followed by the others. They rapidly approached, and were soon within yards of the fight. Somehow, no one had noticed them yet, apart from a few students watching from the castle.

"How dare you!" They suddenly heard someone shout. McGonagall was running to the fight. "How _dare_ you! Leave him alone! _Alone_, I say! On what grounds are you attacking him? He has done nothing, nothing to warrant-"

Four of the people turned, and shot stupefies at her. And then Mustang made their presence known.

A bright ark of flame leaped before the spells, and hit the ground with an explosion that threw the spells and the wizards who had sent them flying backwards. They fumbled to their feet, and redirected their attention to the approaching group.

One of them started to send a spell, before Ed shifted his arm into its usual knife, and sliced the wand in half. "None of you should try anything like that, if you want your arms intact. Everyone understand?" he said coolly, catching the attention of all the fighters.

"Ed..." McGonagall said in surprise. She glanced at the group, and caught sight of Mustang, Winry, and Izumi. "You three..."

"Drop your wands," Izumi said, glaring at the Stunners. "_Now_. I won't be as kind as my apprentice. It won't be your just your arms breaking, I'll tell you that." The wands clattered to the ground. "It's nice to know you're not idiots."

Hagrid had stopped retaliating, and glanced at the group. McGonagall approached more slowly, lowering her wand. All of them...something looked familiar about them...

Winry threw a wrench at Ed's head. "You deformed it again! Idiot! That's why it's always so messed up!"

"Ow, Winry! Look, I'll change it back! My _head_, though, is more important than my _arm_, so would you quit throwing wrenches at it?" Ed yelled back, rubbing his head. He clapped, and his arm shifted back into its normal shape. "Damn..."

Winry glared at him, and snatched her wrench off from the ground.

Al walked up to McGonagall. "You're Professor McGonagall aren't you?" he asked, ignoring the arguments that were breaking out behind him. Somehow, Mustang had gotten involved, and was irritably saying something to Ed over his shoulder.

"Um, yes," she said, looking worriedly behind him.

"Oh, don't worry about them. They won't hurt each other too seriously." Al waved it off. Hawkeye thunked Mustang on the head with the butt of one of her guns. "They do this all the time. I'm Alphonse Elric, Ed's younger brother."

McGonagall looked at him in surprise. "Ed has a brother?" Al nodded. She looked back up at the group. "Do...all these people know him?" She winced as Ed turned his arm into a jagged knife and started chasing Mustang with it for calling him short.

Al nodded again. "Sorry about what he did. Apparently Ed said that he lost his memory, as an excuse for not having a background. That wasn't true. He remembers anything. He just wasn't sure how to tell you..." Mustang snatched a nearby tree branch and threw it at Ed.

"The Weasleys told us. You're all from another dimension," McGonagall said. She nervously saw Izumi throw Ed at Mustang, who flew backward. "Only Professor Dumbledore and I know. Other than the three the twins told before they came to us."

"The Weasley twins?" Al said, cocking his head slightly. Behind him, the two stood and ran away from Izumi. "Fuhrer Mustang and onii-san mentioned them. Something about them dropping them in a hole to avoid their bomb being discovered by Umbridge..."

McGonagall sighed. "Yes, that's what they said too." She looked again at the group, about half of which was arguing. She briefly saw something like a boulder fly up and land on someone. She winced again. That was going to hurt. "Are you sure they're not going to kill each other?"

"Somehow, they never do," Al sighed. Izumi created a fifty-foot pit below Mustang and Ed, who fell in. "It defies logic, yet they manage it."

"We should move this inside," McGonagall said, sending a glare at the Stunners, and motioning the group to move inside. With Al's help, they managed to get the group moving to the doors. They had to drag Mustang and Ed out of the pit. She raised an eyebrow, and pointed in confusion at the person riding a threstral.

"That's Havoc," Al said. "His back... was injured during a fight. His lower half is entirely paralyzed."

Suddenly, it clicked. That was where she'd seen them from. When the boggart had gotten loose, she'd seen them die, fighting those seven beings. She suppressed a gasp, looking at all of them. She didn't think anyone was missing.

Al frowned. "What?"

"The boggart..." She said quietly. At Al's puzzled expression, McGonagall asked, "He didn't tell you?"

"No... He didn't say anything about a boggart." Al said slowly. "What is it?"

"A boggart feeds on people's worst fears. The stronger they are, the stronger the boggart is. Someone dropped a boggart off in a box in a hallway, knowing Ed was going to pass through. They've had a grudge against him for some time now. When he passed, the boggart became strong enough to free itself, which is incredibly rare. When the boggart got free...it showed Ed's worst fears." McGonagall explained. Al was listening aptly to her, and she realized the half of the group who wasn't arguing with Ed, Izumi, and Mustang was also listening. She glanced around at all of them before continuing. "It really wasn't a good time. Some of the kids had gotten out right before... it took the whole afternoon to clean the halls, because a lot of the kids were sick from what they saw."

"What was it?" General Armstrong asked. She had to admit, she was curious.

"...Dead people. And battles, a lot of them. I recognized you all from them. There were also seven people who kept appearing, and they killed you all. Over and over. At one point, the boggart must have gotten a bit disoriented off its sudden surge, and accidentally released a different memory then a fear. One of the beings was burned to death. Ed seemed to focus on it, and the dead bodies disappeared. He snapped at the boggart, and said they had won those battles. He verbally got the boggart back in the box, and left the school building for a few days. We're still not sure where he went."

None of the listeners responded.

"Yeah, that sounds like Ed," Ling said. "I'm going to assume he never saw himself die?"

"No. What we saw was so...different, I didn't think about it, but you're right. Ed never saw himself die," McGonagall said, a bit surprised she hadn't noticed it herself.

Ling sighed. "That either means he's _really_ arrogant, or-"

"What is going on here?" A squeaky voice suddenly said. McGonagall muttered something under her breath, that probably wasn't meant to be kind words.

McGonagall strode forward, coming face-to-face with Umbridge. "That's what I wanted to ask _you,_" she seethed. "You gave permission to allow a professor to be attacked on school grounds! While students were watching! What were you thinking? And on what grounds!"

Umbridge ignored her, and turned to face the group. "Who are you? What are you doing here?" she demanded, attempting to give a 'ferocious' glare at them all. They each met it evenly, some of them with amusement.

"I'm the arsonist," Mustang said calmly. "That's the annoying teenager," he motioned to Ed, who threw something at him, "those are the slaves of paperwork," he motioned to the subordinates, who gave small 'hear hear's, "that's the person who might just blow up your Ministry building if she finds it unsatisfactory," that one was General Armstrong, "that's the only _responsible_ teenager here," obviously, Al, "that's the person who's probably going to shoot me if I don't shut up now, so..." Mustang said, shifting away from Hawkeye, who was shooting daggers at him through her glare.

Umbridge glared at him. "You were in the Great Hall a few months ago." She eyed the group, and pointed to Izumi and Winry. "So were you."

"Yes we were," Winry said irritably, again throwing her wrench at Ed, who again covered his head. "So?"

Umbridge kept the surprise off her face. "What are you doing here?"

"We're trying to find something," Ling said, before anything was thrown at Umbridge. "So if you don't mind us looking for it..."

"Over here, young master!" A shout was heard from halfway up the building. McGonagall, Umbridge, and anyone else not used to Lan Fan on impossibly high heights jumped in surprise. Lan Fan pointed at the window. "It's on this level!"

"G-g-get down from t-there!" Umbridge squeaked.

"Oh, she's fine," Ling said calmly as Lan Fan glared at Umbridge. "She does this all the time." Calling up to Lan Fan, he said, "Okay, we're coming up." He started to lead the group up to the castle.

"Who are you?" Umbridge asked again. "And be serious!

Ed strode up to her, and with a perfectly straight expression, said, "We're aliens. I'm sorry to inform you that we've come to eat your souls."

Ling lost it, and hid behind Al to laugh his head off. Ed tried not to smirk. Al sighed.

Umbridge stared at him.

Hawkeye also sighed, and walked past her. "Don't take what we say seriously. Actually..." She paused. "Actually, Ed might be right. Not on the eating-your-souls part, but technically, we're aliens."

Mustang pondered that. "Yeah... Although I don't think they make passports for that sort of thing." Shrugging, he followed her. With exasperation, the two watched as Ling ignored the entrance and climbed up the wall. "Hey! They have a _door_!"

"So?" Ling called back, and poked the window. "How do we open it?"

Mustang palmed his face and sighed heavily.

* * *

Several minutes later, and they had somehow convinced Dumbledore to let them all in. Grudgingly, Lan Fan and Ling went through the door. Although Lan Fan jumped from bracket to bracket, which stunned passing students, since she managed not to burn herself once.

"The Weasley twins only told us what you told them," Dumbledore said. "We'd like to be able to hear the rest."

Mustang nodded. "Could we take a bit of a detour? There's something we need to pick up here..."

Dumbledore cocked his head. "Some of Ed's things?"

"No," Ed said. "I've got what I need. Hey, Mustang, go ahead, we'll go get it. It won't take us too long."

Mustang nodded, and Ed, Al, Izumi, and Winry followed Lan Fan as she led them down the hallway with Ling. They turned a few corners, with barely any pauses, and circled one particular spot. "It should be here..." Lan Fan frowned. "But there's no door. We might have to break down the wall."

Ed glanced around, and recognized where they were. "No, you don't need to break it down. I know where it is." He walked to a particular part of the wall, and to the confusion of the others, paced past it three times. A door appeared, and he walked to it, swinging it open. "They would've needed a place to hide it, hence..." The others got a look inside, and saw shelves and shelves, cluttered with objects. "The Room of Requirement, storage version." He jerked a thumb inside. "This is what you're looking for."

Lan Fan jumped inside, and quickly leaped from shelf to shelf. "It's close..." she said. She glanced up and nodded at Ed. "This is the right room."

Ling took a different side, and the rest of them moved between the shelves, following the two as they scanned. "Over here!" Lan Fan and Ling finally shouted, and the rest hurried over. "Found it!"

"Okay..." Ed said as he turned the corner, and stared at the diadem in Lan Fan's hands. "Now what do we _do_ with it? May's not here..." He looked up, and noticed everyone was looking at him. "What?" He asked. Lan Fan pushed the diadem toward him. "What, no! No! I'm going to get us killed!"

"Then _don't,_" Ling said, amused. "Come on, it's not like we can do anything better." Ed glared at him, and snatched the diadem. "Fine." Glaring at it, he clapped on both sides of it.

The Horcrux part of the diadem blew up in his face.

Ed sighed. The others snickered at his now soot-covered face. "I hate you all so much right now." They laughed even harder.

* * *

"Ed... is in the military?" McGonagall asked, shocked. Although, a part of her thought it made sense.

So did Harry. "Well, that explains a thing or two," he said. The Gryffindor three had passed them in the hallway, and had ended up going with them to the office. They had just finished listening to Mustang's recount of what had happened to Ed. Abridged, of course, and with one hell of a lot of gaps. Some things didn't need to be public knowledge.

"What did Ed do now?" General Armstrong immediately asked.

"Well..." Ron began, exchanging glances with Harry and Hermione. "Um, he broke Malfoy's foot, and his nose, I think he might have cracked his ribs, he dragged him off the Quidditch field and yelled at him for something,-"

"So that _was_ Ed," McGonagall murmured quietly to herself.

"-and I think he sent Malfoy to Madame Pomphrey more than four times." Ron finished. "And...um..." He glanced at Umbridge, who was in the room. "Uh...he was quite the politician."

"That wasn't even hard for him, from what I saw," Mustang said. He turned to Umbridge. "Your Ministry really has left a lot of gaps that need to be filled in. True, Ed's probably one of the best politicians in Amestris, but anyone with us could have attacked the same way easily." He turned back to Ron. "And I have to say, Malfoy had those coming. I'm surprised Ed didn't kill him after the boggart."

_'Oh...so he was listening to me.' _McGonagall realized.

"But why are you all here?" Umbridge asked, trying to be sweet.

"We have a habit for killing the un-killable," General Armstrong said. "Those beings the boggart projected? Homunuculi. And yes, they do regrow wounds. Supposed to be immortal. Damn close, but not quite."

"We don't even know where He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is!" McGonagall exclaimed.

"We do," May said. "He has a Horcrux with him. He doesn't know this, but we can track those. We've destroyed four of them since we got here last night-"

There was an explosion somewhere else in the school.

"...Five," May corrected. "I think they found it." She glanced, amused, back at the door.

"Five?" Dumbledore asked, looking at them all in surprise. "What? How?"

"Well..." Mustang said. "We blew up one of them, after much trial and error. Another was in a vault, the Lestrange's, I think, and we ended up just blowing up the whole vault, since the damn things in it just kept multiplying and we couldn't _find _the stupid thing. I think Ed just tried to-and did-decompose another one. And May used alkahestery on another one. Which was probably the only destruction that didn't blow up in our faces. One of them was destroyed in Harry's second year; the diary. Voldemort's snake-" The teachers flinched at the name, and Mustang barely suppressed rolling his eyes "-is with him, and you're the other one." Mustang glanced at Harry, who jumped in surprise.

"I'm a...what?" Harry asked, shocked.

"You didn't tell him?" Mustang asked, raising an eyebrow. "Huh. Might want to now."

Sighing, Dumbledore explained the Horcruxes to everyone standing in the room. He turned back to Mustang. "Can you confirm it?"

"He can't," May said. "I can. Alkahestery focuses on the flow of chi, or the 'Dragon's Pulse', as alkahesterists call it. The Horcruxes mess up the flow, and I can tell where the mess-up is. So can Ling and Lan Fan."

Dumbledore nodded thoughtfully.

"Wait...if we want to destroy the Horcrux inside of me, does that mean I have to die?" Harry frowned.

"Not necessarily," Mustang said. "True, if you did, it'd get rid of the Horcrux, but we could also just split you from it, and then destroy it once it's out. Or it just might destroy itself when it no longer has a container."

There was a girlish yell from outside, followed by a shriek, a thud, and several sounds of breaking bones.

No one in the room moved, other than to exchanged either worried or amused glances.

"Ten bucks that was the chief," Havoc said. The threstral was looking around the office, curious.

As Havoc had guessed, Ed came up the stairs a few seconds later, slightly blood splattered. The ones following behind him looked amused. "Someone needs to get Malfoy to the infirmary," he growled. "Or I think he might die from blood loss."

"I'll go drag him there," Izumi sighed, and left. Several of the teachers had horrified expressions, that were just enhanced when Mustang turned to Ed and asked, "So how many bones did you break this time?"

"His arm, I think his leg, or it's at least cracked, and probably a back bone, and several ribs," Ling said cheerfully.

"Nii-san..." Al sighed.

"He had it coming," Ed said grumpily. Mustang rolled his eyes, but was forced to admit that Ed was right. "Next time the bastard decides to release a boggart in the hallways, he'll be thinking twice."

"Yeah, 'cause you bashed his brain cells out, and now he can't think straight," Havoc muttered. Ed shot him a glare, and Havoc grinned.

"What were the Horcruxes?" Dumbledore asked.

"Um, a ring, a locket, a cup, and..." Mustang said, as the people who had the Horcruxes brought them out. "That," he said, when Ed presented the last one.

"That's... Salazar Slytherin's locket, Helga Hufflepuff's cup, and Rowena Ravenclaw's lost diadem!"* McGonagall exclaimed in surprise. "They were all made into Horcruxes?"

"Yeah. The diadem's not so lost anymore," Ed said.

* * *

**Havoc paused, cocking his head. He could vaguely hear shouting. "Is it just me, or do I hear fangirls shouting?" He frowned. The others looked at him in confusion.

"Um...what?" Mustang asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I think I hear fangirls..."

* * *

a/n: sorry, bad way to end the chapter. But it's getting a bit long, and I still need other stuff for the next chapters. Sorry to all those people who thought Ed was going to break the Horcrux news to Dumbledore. I'd already written this when I got your messages.

*I have no clue anymore whose is what anymore. I've gotten different responses every time I change it, or I'm just an idiot, but I think this is either finally right or I screwed it up again.

**this is a part that's a joke. This part is out to Panda123

The reason why Havoc came in was because I'm replacing his wheelchair with a threstral. Any of you reading this soooo did not see that coming.

R & R, please. I'm actually going to admit that I'm blackmailing you all. Every time I get a review, I post another one. Although now that I've told you this, I must have five reviews before I post again! MWAHAHAHA! BLACKMAIL IS THE SOLUTION TO EVERYTHING! _{Yes, yes it is. Unless you offer me a cookie, and then I can dangle her off a bridge and make her post the next one but that's technically blackmail as well. It's your choice: one cookie vs. five reviews. Just saying...}_...o.O. I hate you so much right now.

Tsuki, insert random comment I won't notice until it's too late here: _{This is my random comment for the day...I WANNA HAVE A COOOKIESSSSS! But that's not the point...} _great. SO GET TO IT! and check your grammar while you're at it...jeez... _{...I forgot. Sowwy! 3}_... STFU


	13. Well That was Stupid

a/n: you all actually listened to me! sorry, I was gone the whole day so I wasn't able to post these...

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter to my knowledge. If I did, then I wouldn't have killed off Hughes, Greed, Buccaneer, Fu, or Barry, or anyone else awesome who died. And if I owned Harry Potter, I wouldn't have killed off Sirius, Lupin, Tonks, George, Moody, Hedwig, or Dobby. So there.

* * *

A day later, and things had gone from crazy with Hagrid being attacked, to hectic with dimensional visitors popping in to say they'd practically cleared up the whole problem they'd spent years trying to fix at Hogwarts. Oh, and a mysterious boy who had 'lost memory' apparently had memory that wasn't all that 'lost'.

And then...

"Okay, we're going to go ahead and get the Horcrux out of Harry," Mustang sighed. He'd just finished arguing with a fuming Fudge, and it had ended up taking the whole day. "Then we'll go after the snake. Hey, Fullmetal, go get Harry."

"I'm not your slave!" Ed yelled at him irritably, then turned and stalked out of the room. Havoc was snoring on his threstral (since his desk was-luckily for him-to short now for him), much to the amusement of everyone else, and didn't move as Ed slammed the door closed.

After a few minutes of walking, and talking with some teachers, including an irritable Umbridge, who had just managed to get away from an angry herd of centaurs, he learned that Harry, Hermione, Ron, and a few other people, had apparently left the grounds for some reason, with no authorization from any professor.

"You have _got_ to be kidding me," Ed muttered, and stalked back to where Mustang was currently situated. He threw the door open, and announced, "Harry and his friends are busy pulling off some hair-brained scheme that's probably going to get them killed. Who wants to go drag their asses back?"

Mustang sighed, and chose some people as Ed walked to Dumbledore's office to figure out where they'd gone.

* * *

Minutes later, and they were storming the Ministry which was, for whatever reason, empty. "Creepy, much?" Ed muttered, as the three Xingese led them confidently to where Harry was. After some confusion of moving doors, and Izumi finally blowing the room up and causing the doors to come to a stop after they entered and left each one, they finally found the room they were looking for.

Mustang threw the door open, in time for the others to hear, "Your death will not come as a great shock..." *

Death Eaters were pointing wands at either Harry or Neville, who was being held by a Death Eater. A woman with a bad hair day was pointing a wand at Neville, and had just finished speaking. They whipped around to see the source of the slamming door, and didn't seem to be impressed by their entrance. "Ooo, muggles? In the Ministry? That's new."

"I'm a house wife, damn it!" Izumi yelled back at her. She clapped, and slammed one of her hands into a wall. The wall expanded, and a fist shot out to hit the Death Eater. With a shriek, she flew behind one of the benches. "Anyone else want to criticize so that I can hit you?" She glared, and the Death Eaters nervously glanced between her, the fist, and the previously-flying Death Eater.

"Hm. Nobody's speaking up," Mustang said, almost sounding disappointed. "Not that we care," he snapped, and the Death Eater holding Neville was given second degree burns. Neville jumped away from the Death Eater as he fell.

Ed leaped forward, and started fighting with his usual knife. He glanced someone with blond hair moving near him, and gave a small smirk. Al, as a suit of armor, dodged past him, and slammed a fist into one of the Death Eater's faces.

A knife caught one of them in the arm, and he yelled and fell backward. Ed muttered, "Wuss", and ducked under Lan Fan as she jumped over him. Ling was slashing away at the wands of the Death Eaters with his sword.

Hearing the commotion, a few more Death Eaters hurried into the room. One of them was grabbed by the head, and the others whipped around to see what was happening. The body dropped, blood flying from it. They bolted away from Scar, only to be attacked by General Armstrong's sword.

Harry leaped off the tier he was standing on, and grabbed Neville. The two sprinted for the door, and opened it, about to run out it. Their progress, however, was stopped by the people coming in. Sirius held out his hands in reflex, making the two halt. "Sirius!" Harry shouted in surprise.

"Um, yeah..." Sirius glanced behind the two, and saw what was going on. "Well, it looks like they've got this under control."

Moody grumbled something, and pushed past the two. Lupin sighed, and followed him.

"Let's go see how this turns out!" Tonks said cheerfully, and walked into the room. Kingsley walked after her, and the three left shrugged, and followed them.

The Death Eaters who were not either under fists, burned enough to be smart enough to not move a finger, slowly bleeding out, or howling like an idiot about broken bones were quickly being taken out. Izumi swept half the wall at the rest of them, and Ed bound them to the floor. Mustang nodded at the approaching Order members, and asked Harry and Neville where the other students were.

"Here and there..." Harry said. "We got split up, and I'm not sure where everyone is now. They were all alive the last time we saw them."

Mustang nodded again, and Lan Fan and Ling departed without being asked. They came back a few minutes later, helping all the kids they had rounded up into the room. By that time, Al had been asked multiple times about the armor.

"The Truth told me it was mine to use. I can switch between this body and my normal body whenever I want to," Al explained. "Look." He clapped, and placed both hands on his chest plate. There was a flash, and the flesh-and-blood Al was standing there a moment later. "I spent a few years fighting in that form, so I just got more used to it than this one."

"How did do fide dus?" Neville asked, voice messed up from a blood nose.

"The Xingese-Ling, Lan Fan, and May-can sense Harry, because he's partially made up of a Horcrux. We realized he was missing when we were trying to find him to get the Horcrux out. _Now_ can we get it out?" Izumi asked in exasperation.

Sirius warily glanced at Harry. "It won't kill him, will it?"

"No," May said. She threw five knives at the ground, and scratched a pentagram in between them. "Stand here, but don't destroy the pattern." She said, motioning to Harry. He slowly walked toward her, and stepped into the alkahestery design. She activated it, and Harry flinched slightly. Some sort of white smoke emanated from him, and gathered in front. The pentagram died down, and the smoke exploded into nothing, the Horcrux no longer having a container.

Harry and May looked at each other, and May sighed. "Why does it always have to explode?"

Ed snickered. "At least it wasn't me this time." He took note of both of their singed clothing and hair. Harry's face was black from the explosion, like Ed's had been with the diadem.

"So, how many are left?" Kingsley asked. "Since apparently Horcruxes have become common knowledge."

"One," Izumi said, shocking the Order members. "We destroyed the rest. Voldemort's snake is the last." Izumi looked like she was going to continue, before the second door to the room opened, to let enter one more person. If that's what he was still classified as. (Birth certificate: um...we're not sure if it's human. I mean, seriously. Where the hell is it's _nose_?)

Voldemort walked in. "I am Lord Voldemort. What are muggles doing in the-"

"I'm trying to talk here, you ugly son of a bastard! So get the f*** out of this story line!" Izumi strode up to him, and kicked him. He stumbled backward, and started to take out his wand. Izumi snatched it, and threw it to Ed. Ed, having no idea what to do with it, threw it at Mustang, who burned it to a crisp. Izumi grabbed Voldemort's collar, and threw him across the room.

The Ministry officials, who had been alerted by Dumbledore, chose that moment to walk in the first door. Fudge, the first, was hit by a flying Voldemort.

"And you said he was dead," Ed muttered, watching the fight.

Izumi stormed across the room, and proceeded to beat the crap out of Lord Voldemort.

After one particularly long throw, Voldemort stood, and said, "You can not defeat me. You have not the means, and you do not know what you need to do, you-" Voldemort stopped mid-sentence, and fell backwards, blood spilling from his head.

The Death Eaters stopped their fights, horrified. They looked wildly around for the source.

Mustang smirked, and nodded at Hawkeye, who was in a sniper position. She was pointing a Baretta where Voldemort had been standing. Straight-faced, she said, "He was irksome."

"Nice," Ling said, stabbing downward with his sword. The snake that had gone unnoticed by everyone but the Xingese died. "And there goes the last Horcrux." He turned to the Ministry officials. "Well, he's dead _now_. Anything to say about that?"

Fudge was still on the floor, stuttering. "Um-uh-what?"

"Someone get him to a mental hospital," Mustang said nonchalantly.

"What happened here?" Fudge finally managed it.

"Voldemort," the Ministry officials flinched, "-get a grip-sent his Death Eaters here to ambush some people he led here, and then came here himself. We also came, attacked, and...well..." He motioned at the Death Eaters in the room. "Anyway, I thought it was pretty self-explanatory."

More questions were thrown around, and finally Ling snapped at them all. "Look, you've already shown your incapability of defending your own _base_, and now you've shown your incapability of _listening_. Anything else?"

The officials stopped talking, and shifted uncomfortably.

"So...that's him?" someone asked, pointing at Voldemort's body.

"Yup," Ed said. "Thought we went over that already."

"Sirius Black!" someone shouted, pointing at the Order member who had just now been noticed.

"Hm?" Sirius said, looking up. "Oh..."

Mustang sighed. "Look-drop your wands already!" Mustang snapped as several of the witches and wizards raised their wands. "You don't react when you should, and you overreact when theres's nothing to react _to_! How you've managed this long is a mystery."

The wizards and witches hesitated. "Um..." one said.

"But-but-he's a convicted murderer!" Fudge squeaked.

"So am I," a voice behind them said. They whipped around, and parted as Ross pushed people aside. "Doesn't mean I actually killed someone. Hey, Fuhrer!" She called, saluting.

"Major Ross?" He responded. "How did you get through?"

An anime sweat mark appeared on Ross's head. "Er, I came to warn you that Colonel Armstrong came through."

There was no movement for a second from the people from a different dimension. And then all the ones under eighteen bolted for the door not crowded by people, Mustang sighed, Hawkeye shook her head, and Ross started backing away from the doorway she was standing in.

"What?" Fudge asked, wary.

"Just...um, start running and you might miss him," Mustang said, also with an anime sweat mark.

"Fuhrer Mustang!" Another voice shouted out boisterously.

"Too late," Mustang sighed.

* * *

*This was Bellatrix Lestrange

I hope you all liked that! I am both sad and happy to inform you that that was my end to this fanfic. This unfortunately means I can no longer bitch at Umbridge. *cries* That was one hell of a lot of fun, which a lot of people apparently agree with me on. But this also means I can move on with stories I've been meaning to type. I promised a few people I would make a longer Maximum Ride/Fullmetal Alchemist crossover, and I've got an awesome NCIS/FMA crossover planned.

I was originally planning on doing a school fanfic with Fullmetal Alchemist which would allow me to pwn Umbridge indirectly by pwning teachers we all hate, but I realized that were some problems. Like, a lot. It just wouldn't have been worth it. Sorry, people.

I've had an awesome time writing this fanfic, and Tsuki's had a fun time posting random comments on here and being my beta reader, and all of my reviewers and people who read this have made it worthwhile. Thank you all for reading this! It's really meant a lot to me! You all kept me going for my longest fanfic so far, and I love you all for it!


	14. First Random Excerpt

Now, for all you faithful reviewers who loved me bitching at Umbridge. I am posting an extra chapter that does not fit into the story line, but I originally planned to happen. I wasn't able to put it in because the story line changed slightly, but it was a part of epic pwnage for Malfoy and Umbridge. So, I'll put this in as an extra chapter for you people who want more pwnage. (when I wrote that part, it doubled Umbridge's pwnage tally and threw her into the seventies :P)

I _still_ don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter. I _do_, however, own this fanfic I'm posting, so try to steal it, and _I will smite your sorry ass down_. ;P _{she means I'll cut off your reproductive organs. XD} _Girls?: don't ask, but it's possible, and involves coat hangers. And guys? She has a knife in her hands. Yes, she's very twisted. Don't piss her off.

* * *

Ed sighed, trying to stay awake in Umbridge's class. As of yet, Umbridge had not said anything worthy of him contradicting it. He was betting on Mustang making his reappearance, but that hadn't happened yet.

Finally, she said something. "And that is how a simple shield spell is used. No, moving on to the-" Umbridge paused as Ed waved his hand in an annoying manner back and forth. "What?"

"Well, vote from the class, who honestly thinks they can do that spell without practicing?" he asked, glancing around the classroom. No one raised their hands. "Who _doesn't_ think they can do the spell without practicing?"

"It is not your place to be asking questions of the class-" Umbridge began, but stopped when the whole class raised their hands. She glared at them. "You have no need to use them in school, because no one would be attacking sweet, innocent children like yourselves, even if they _could_ get past the security of the school."

"Kids get attacked all the time."

"Name one occasion a child was attacked, and by who."

"Oh hell, at least pick something _hard_ for me to attack against." Ed snorted. "The occasion? Me being thrown over a butcher shop. By who? My teacher." He paused, realizing he had just slipped up. "Er..."

Umbridge perked up.

That moment was when Izumi Curtis, housewife, alchemist, and meat seller, decided to enter.

"You. _Little. IDIOT!_" She shouted, slamming open the door and striding across the room. Ed faced her in his chair with a petrified expression. She grabbed his robe, and threw him across the room. "What the hell were you thinking? Next time, take your brother with you!" She threw Al, who Ed now noticed had been being dragged behind her, at Ed. The combined weight knocked down the wall Ed had been standing in front of as they flew into it.

"Who are you?" Umbridge said, quivering slightly.

Izumi turned to her. "Umbridge, right?" Umbridge gave a tiny nod. Izumi glared at her, and said, "Your teaching method is shit." She proceeded to pick up the nearest desk and throw it at Umbridge.

Students were now making the wise decision to abandon their desks (making sure they left their books behind) to line up against the wall.

Izumi had no interest in them, however. She turned back to Ed and Al. "At least send a post card!"

"Priority Mail wouldn't take it," Ed groaned. He glanced at Al as he pushed himself up. "Hey, nice to see you again."

"Wish it were under less painful circumstances," Al groaned, and the two dodged another desk.

The students were now trying to get out of the classroom, but the door was being pressed against by kids looking in on the other side curiously. Malfoy was laughing at the brothers.

Not for long.

"I don't know _how_ you're still alive after all the stupid stunts you've pulled!" Izumi shouted, and grabbed the two, hurling them into the wall with the door. The wall fell, taking the brothers with it, and Malfoy, who happened to be under it.

"Oh the pain..." Ed groaned, and Al laughed. "My brain cells are slowly dying..."

"Yeah, and there'll be more of that!" Another voice yelled. Students had by then learned to get out of the way of angry people they didn't know, and scooted into a path for Winry, who was walking between them. She threw a wrench, and it bounced of Malfoy's head, who had just gotten up, and into Ed's face.

"Ow!" Ed yelped, falling backward again. Al dodged him, and the stack of flying books that landed on Ed.

Umbridge, who had managed to get up, backed away from the four and into the students. Malfoy scrambled to his feet, and stood beside her. Wrong move.

"Edward Elric!" Another voice proclaimed, and trampled the students in the way if they didn't move fast enough to get to the clearing in the students where Ed and Al were. Umbridge and Malfoy were among the ones trampled by a charging Colonel Armstrong.

"Shit!" Ed shouted, and pulled Al along with him as they ran for their lives.

Needless to say, many kids, including Umbridge and Malfoy, were sent to the hospital wing that day, due to Amestrians storming Hogwarts to try and kill Ed.


	15. Second Random Excerpt

a/n: Damn. I keep saying that "this is the last chapter", or whatever. I'm hoping that this one will _actually_ be the last. Okay, so this is like the previous one, an alternate part of the series that I thought was funny, but just didn't fit in. In my head's eye, this part was funny enough for me to type it out. It's right after Mustang and Hawkeye went through the worlds, except on a lighter note than the serious tone it was in. I don't have any other story parts for this fanfic up my sleeve, and that's why I definitely think that this will be the last one. Thanks again to all of you for reading this!

* * *

"Hey, Ed," Ron said, nudging Ed. "Hey, wake up."

Ed let out a grunt, and looked up. "What?" He snapped.

"Classes are going to begin soon. The teachers are already gone, and so are almost all the students," Hermione explained, looking around the nearly-empty Great Hall. "If we don't get going soon, we're going to be late."

"Just let me sleep," Ed muttered, and put his head back on the table.

"Ed!" All three shouted at him. He ignored them.

"Just leave him. If he's late, it's his own fault," Harry grumbled.

"Hear hear," Ed said, lacking enthusiasm.

"Get to class." Hermione replied, and whipped around on her heel. The three left the Great Hall, leaving Ed behind. He'd been awake, studying the library again, for the past few nights, and hadn't been able to sleep. He'd been dozing off in his previous classes, and he figured by now it didn't really make a difference where he was because he'd be sleeping. Maybe he could check into the hospital ward and say his arm was bothering him...

* * *

"Okay, he should be somewhere in this school..." Mustang muttered. He and Hawkeye were walking through the halls of Hogwarts, trying to locate Ed. "Unless we just missed each other, and he's in Amestris right now. Excuse me, how can I locate a student?" he asked a passing adult.

The woman surveyed the two. "It depends. Why do you want to find a student? Are you his parents?"

"Not even close," Mustang replied. "We're looking for him because I've got a group of irritable friends of his breathing down my back about finding him, we've got bets running in his home country about how long it'll take for him to reappear, and he still owes me money."

"Are you still stuck on those fifty cenz?" Hawkeye sighed.

"Of course." Mustang smirked. "Why shouldn't I be?"

"What do you mean?" The professor frowned.

"He went missing from his country, shortly after defying all logic and beating a sort-of-immortal-but-not-really being with just his fists, and also saving his brother's life. Ever since he went missing, his country, and Xing's, has been placing bets on how long it'll take him to return. A lot of his friends want him back to yell at him for pulling off stunts like this. And he owes me money because...you know, I don't really know what he needed it for. His brother and he just kind of ambushed me."

The teacher's eye was twitching. "Where his home country again?"

"Adjacent to this dimension by forty-five degrees, spun clockwise. Amestris."

The professor didn't look like she believed them. "Assuming I believe your story, who am I looking for?"

"Depends on what name he took. He might have done an alias...I don't know. Fullmetal, Ed, Edward, Elric, any of those sound familiar?" Mustang shrugged. "Blond hair, braid, shorter than most five year olds?"

"He's not _that_ short, Fuhrer," Hawkeye said.

The professor blinked in surprise at the names. She covered it quickly. "And how did he cross universes?"

"Payment. He would've gotten back on his own if he'd had the right research materials," Mustang answered. "Can we go find him now?"

"What is going on here?" Another voice asked. "Professor McGonagall, who are these people?"

Mustang and Hawkeye recognized distaste flashing across McGonagall's face. "They know and are looking for a student here, Professor Umbridge."

"Oh? Which student?" A stubby woman asked, trying something that was probably supposed to be a smile. It looked like a frog in the process of throwing up its organs while eating hot, spicy, taco sauce.*

"Ed."

Umbridge blinked. She turned to Mustang and Hawkeye. "Why are you looking for him? That child is nothing but a trouble-maker-"

"Yup, that's him. And trouble-maker he may be, but idiot and shy he is not. Don't call him a child to his face, or he'll probably take your head off. We need him back home, before his teacher kills me and strings my organs all over Central."

Hawkeye was pretty sure Mustang was enjoying this whole scenario.

"Central?"

"Capitol of Amestris, Fullmetal's home country," Mustang said.

"Who's Fullmetal?" Another voice asked.

The group turned to see another professor walking up. "Oh great, more people," Mustang sighed. "Okay, can we just get him and go? He'll be out of your hair then."

"Who do you need?" the new professor asked.

"Severus, these people are looking for Ed," McGonagall explained to him.

"Really? What do they want with the alchemist who nearly blew up my room?" Snape asked, an eyebrow quirking in amusement.

"Well, you were blowing it up with him." McGonagall shrugged. "They say he needs to go back to his home country in another galaxy. Who's Fullmetal?" McGonagall asked the Amestrians.

"Ed. Fullmetal's his military term," Mustang explained. "Do you want us out of here or not?"

The three professors looked like they all wanted to say something, but neither had a chance before something on Mustang started beeping. He looked down at his hand, and they saw an array glowing there. "Oh damn it. She was serious, wasn't she?" He sighed in defeat. "Great. Now we have to deal with his teacher."

Sparks of electricity flew in an array like the one on Mustang's hand beside him and Hawkeye. The two watched as Izumi and Al appeared in the center, Izumi glaring around her.

"Have you found the little runt _yet_?" She asked.

"Having trouble with them." Mustang cocked his head at the professors, who were staring at the new pair slack-jawed. "For whatever reason, they don't think we're telling them the truth."

"Fuhrer, we didn't even know there were other dimensions until last month." Hawkeye sighed.

"Um, where's Ed?" Al asked the professors. "We've been looking for him for a while."

"How did you do that? Appartition isn't possible in-" Umbridge began.

"He should be in class," McGonagall interrupted. "I don't know his schedule, but we should be able to find him quickly. Speaking of class, we all should be in our own right now." McGonagall looked around at the other two professors. "Harry and his friends are in my class, and Ed has a similar schedule to them. If he's not with them, they'll know where he is."

"How do you do that?" Mustang scowled, and glanced at Al. The younger Elric shrugged.

A scowling Umbridge walked off, as did Snape. McGonagall led the Amestrians to her classroom, whose inhabitants looked up anxiously at her when she opened the door. She walked to the trio she had mentioned. "Do any of you three know where Ed is right now?"

Hermione glanced at the four behind her, and nodded. "We couldn't get him to come to class because he was tired, and I think he's still sleeping in the Great Hall."

McGonagall sighed. "Can you three take them there? I have a class to teach." She had a feeling that the last place she wanted to be when Ed met his teacher was with him.

She was right.

The three exchaged glances, and stood. They walked out into the hallway, and started leading the Amestrians down the hallway. "You look a lot like Ed," Hermione commented to Al.

"I'm his brother," Al responded. "We're a year apart."

"Oh. Um, are you his parents, or relatives?" Ron looked at the adults.

"No. I'm his teacher, she works with him in the military, and he is the leader of the country. Which Ed's going to be ticked about." Izumi introduced. "Long story."

They made it to the Great Hall. Sure enough, Ed was sleeping on the table.

"Wonderful." Mustang smirked an evil smirk. Al and Hawkeye both sighed. Mustang took the clipboard that Hawkeye had brought (to possibly use to bash in the heads of Mustang and Ed in case they started fighting), and walked up to where Ed sat. "Hey, miniature pipsqueak. Wake up." He pulled back half of the clipboard, and let it go. The clipboard flipped forward, and slammed against the table next to Ed's head.

He flipped off the table in suprise.

"Best wake up call. _Ever_." Mustang smirked again.

"You! What are you doing here!" Ed exclaimed. "And-Sensei!" He looked in horror as Izumi walked toward him.

"You IDIOT!" She yelled at him.

The trio watched, anime sweat marks slipping down the backs of their heads, as Ed ran around the room trying to dodge his teacher. Okay, maybe Voldemort wasn't all that bad...

* * *

*Just...don't ask. Don't even ask. I don't think this is physically possible.


	16. ANNOUNCEMENT

It's been a while, huh? A little over two years, actually.

Since, as I just said, it's been _quite_ a while since I wrote this story, I would like to hope that my writing's a little more advanced than it was at the time of when I originally typed it out. For one thing, I hadn't had a lot of experience then and I've gone through a lot more trial-and-error since.

Basically, I'd like to rewrite this. I think I'm going to, and I think I'm going to very soon while I'm still motivated to do it. The plot would be the same, but there would be a few awkward lines that would be rewritten, some strange scenes that would be taken out or replaced, and some new things would be added in to make it smoother (for example, the ending, which was really fast).

If you really liked this story, please let me know the following:

1) Anything you didn't like

2) Any specific scenes/lines you want me to keep

3) Something you think I should add in

I won't say it will happen, but it lets me know what you all were interested in when you read it. If it was mentioned in a review, it's been marked down for consideration.


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